Page 49 of Every Silent Lie

We’re getting divorced because I was behaving unreasonably.

I toss down the pen and scrub my palms down my face. My phone ringing makes me jump and drop my hands, and his name on the screen throws me into an infuriating conflict of hope and hate. It’s been three days since he kissed me and walked away. He’s left me hanging, waiting for contact, and he chooses now to call me? At gone four o’clock on Monday? Is he checking if I’m going to the bar? Will he tell me not to if he can’t make it? I breathe in, not liking the direction of my thoughts. Why else would he call now? Why wouldn’t he just head to the bar and see me there?

Where was he on Saturday and Sunday? With not even a message—anything after that kiss to tell me . . . I don’t know. Something.

It could be my low mood after such a shitty weekend—seeing her in the store, seeing Mindy at Mum’s care home, the extra pressure my ex is putting on me through my family, and his persistent calls. It could be my disappointment that Dec kissed me like he was breathing life into me again and then left me to survive all weekend alone. It could be the battle my heart and head are having. Get close. Don’t. I don’t know, but I reject his call, dropping my mobile into my bag, then I knock my divorce papers away with an angry sweep of my hand, and yell at thin air.

Not surprisingly, the bar is dead, only one guy in the corner on his phone, and Julio is slicing lemons. I don’t miss his surprise when he clocks me, but he doesn’t say a word as he prepares my drinks. “Just one,” I say as I dump my things on the second to last stool. Another inevitable fleeting look of surprise comes my way, but, again, he doesn’t say a word, making me just one dirty martini instead of my usual two.

My eyes follow his working hands as he prepares my drink, waiting for him to speak up. Ask me what I’m doing here. Ask me where Dec is. He doesn’t. “One martini,” he says, sliding it across the bar and wiping his hands on the towel hanging from one of the belt loops on his trousers. “Enjoying the weather?”

“Do I look like I’m enjoying the weather?” I ask, on autopilot, reaching down to my boots and pulling them off, replacing them with my heels.

“I can’t tell.” He gets back to his lemons, pulling his chopping board closer to us so he can keep his voice low in the quiet bar. “You’re hard to read.” One quick flick of his curious eyes up to me. “Your friend not joining you?”

“What friend?” I ask, picking up the cocktail stick and pulling the olive off with my teeth.

“So it’s like that, huh?”

“Like what?”

His knife lowers, his hands bracing on the bar as he takes an inhale. “Forgive me if I’m speaking out of turn but, Christ, lady, you’re cooler than the sub-zero temperature out there.”

Whether it’s warranted or not, I bristle. I can’t help it. “You’re definitely speaking out of turn.”

“Then I don’t suppose I’m getting a tip today.”

I laugh on the inside—it’s sardonic—and take my first glorious sip of the martini. “You know, you make the best ones.”

“Is that why you come here most?” I tilt my head, and Julio smiles out the corner of his mouth as he gets back to slicing, this time limes. “My brother works at The Regent.”

“Ah,” I breathe. “Short guy, receding hairline, charming twinkle in his eyes?”

“That’s him. Ren.”

“And how did you two come to make the connection with me, The Regent, and here?”

His smile stretches, the kind of smile that’s somewhere between cheeky and embarrassed. “He mentioned a lady in her thirties, dark, mid-length hair, an attractive mole on her cheek, on the slimmer side of slender, stoic, always orders two dirty martinis, one of which remains on the bar while she drinks a further three, four, five, sometimes six, before she finally drinks that initial second martini.”

What he hasn’t finished with is, and then leaves with a man. “I guess that second martini gave the game away, huh?”

He chuckles as I sip, and he loads his sliced fruits into a tub. “Do you know what I’m wondering?”

“I don’t know, and I’m not sure I want to.”

The lid clicks onto the pot with a few loud pops, and he leans across the bar, making me recline back on my stool. “You’re right. You probably don’t.” He nods past me, and I peek back to see the guy in the corner looking this way. “Someone’s got his eye on you.”

“Hasn’t he just,” I muse, turning slightly on my stool. “How do I look?”

“Cold. But he looks like he wants to warm you up.”

“Ha ha,” I drone, maintaining eye contact with the man. He’s handsome, in a Hugh Grant kind of way. A bit preppy. A lot floppy. He’s too far away to see if there’s a ring. No married men.

I inhale and face the bar again, having a little argument with myself. Dec’s married. I’m married. Take the distraction. Irritatingly, it’s not just my past I need distracting from.

Dec.

I growl under my breath and neck the rest of my drink. Leave. I should go home before I find out if that man behind me has a ring on his finger. Before I succumb to brief, mindless pleasure. Before I return to old habits. “One more, please,” I say, pushing my glass to Julio. He gets to work, as my phone vibrates on the bar, the screen lighting up.