Page 14 of Forever, Maybe
Chapter ten
Waiters circulated among the tables, offering teas and coffees that were mostly waved away.
The punters were either too busy polishing off their beers and wine or unwilling to risk caffeine’s late-night effects.
Another ten minutes of polite chit-chat, and Daniel could finally make his excuses and leave.
He and Ronnie had the table to themselves now, its surface cluttered with the remnants of dessert—half-eaten clootie dumpling and custard, the latter only Joe had bothered to finish.
Empty beer bottles and glasses smeared with lipstick added to the mess, the scene a snapshot of an evening dragging on past its peak.
Ronnie’s face brightened as a woman who looked like a ten years’ younger version of his wife approached. “Sit down, sit down!” he urged, patting the chair beside him and grinning with exaggerated cheer.
The avuncular act didn’t quite mask the glaze of lust in his eyes as his gaze dropped to the deep neckline of her silver-sequinned dress, her chest catching the light—and his attention—with every step.
She favoured the same approach to hair and make-up as Nell’s friend, Stephanie.
Way, way, way over the top: blonde hair swept to one side, false eyelashes, skin tone that weird orangey-colour and mask-like, and scarlet lipstick that matched her fingernails.
Her perfume was just as in-your-face, the notes of vanilla, cinnamon so intense that she must have sprayed herself with half a bottle of the stuff.
She slid into the seat next to Daniel instead of Ronnie, her choice a clear sign of her ability to spot a man who hadn’t yet realised just how much women despised being pawed at by ageing leches. Leaning slightly across Daniel, she extended a hand to Ronnie, keeping him at arm’s length.
“Ronnie!” she trilled, her tone polished and bright. “Lovely to see you again. How’s business?”
Ronnie launched into a long-winded update on his latest developments and investments, rehashing the same drivel that had bored Daniel half an hour earlier.
The woman’s thigh brushed his as she chimed in with admiring words, which might mean God, isn’t Ronnie boring, or that she was flirting with him.
The sour tang of white wine clung to her breath, suggesting it might be a bit of both.
“Daniel, have you met Jennifer? She writes for the Scottish Post, ” Ronnie said at last, remembering his manners.
Jennifer smiled, all teeth—a wolfish grin that didn’t quite reach her pale blue eyes, which were startlingly large and round.
They were her best feature, though a faint pink rim against her heavy black eyeliner gave them a hint of vulnerability that felt oddly out of place with the rest of her polished appearance.
“We spoke on the phone when I interviewed him for the Scotland’s Weekend section,” she said smoothly, turning her attention to Daniel. “But no, we haven’t met in person. Hello, Daniel!”
She twisted in her chair, grasping Daniel’s hand and holding it just a moment too long, the contact teetering on the edge of polite.
At the interview the other day, he’d mentioned attending the Taste of Scotland awards.
Was her presence here coincidental? It had to be.
Tickets were expensive and scarce. Impossible to secure last minute.
Ronnie, oblivious, found one of the unused glasses on the table and reached for a bottle of red wine. He tipped it over the glass, the liquid glugging noisily until it stopped an inch shy of the rim. “Drink up!” he boomed.
Bet, who had been absent for the last ten minutes after spotting a gaggle of fellow ladies-who-lunch at another table, reappeared. “Jennifer! How lovely to see you! You look gorgeous!”
Her smile might have been pleasant, but her tone and body language radiated strong ‘back off, bitch’ energy.
Jennifer responded with a breezy waggle of her hand. “Bet. As do you. That necklace is something else.”
“Shush, keep your voice down!” Ronnie cut in, ironically much louder than either of them, his volume dialled up by a steady mix of wine and Scotch. “Bet’s wearing so many diamonds she’s a security risk!”
He leant back in his chair, clearly delighted with himself, as a few heads turned their way.
Nicky returned to the table just in time to catch the exchange. She shot Daniel a wry grin, her necklace—a simple silver chain with a painted seashell nestled between the twin mounds of her freckled breasts—making a quiet statement. Much nicer than Bet’s flashy display.
Another image flashed through his mind: unfastening the clasp of Nicky’s necklace as she unzipped her dress, his hands sliding over the bump, marvelling at the tautness of her skin.
God. Inappropriate thoughts about his best friend’s wife—for the second time tonight. Go directly to jail, do not pass Go, etcetera.
“Not drinking, then?” Jennifer’s voice cut through his self-recrimination. Her fingers slid slowly up and down the stem of her wine glass, deliberate and suggestive.
He shook his head. “Early start in the morning.”
The truth— I don’t drink at all —always sparked further questions, so he wheeled out the early start excuse, which was more often truthful than it was not.
Jennifer tilted her head in Nicky’s direction. “When’s your wife due?”
Ah. She’d mistaken Nicky for Nell. He shook his head again, more firmly this time. “Nothing to do wi’ me. Nicky’s Joe’s much better half. Nell had another commitment tonight.”
“Nell?”
“Aye, my wife.” Come to think of it, he hadn’t mentioned Nell’s name when recounting their first meeting during the interview. He offered more. “She’s a graphic designer and artist. Before she went freelance, she worked for the council and White Lightning Communications. D’you ken her?”
The motion of her fingers stopped abruptly, mid-stroke and her mouth tightened in a thin line. She swirled the wine in her glass, then knocked back half of it in one go. “No.”
It was an obvious lie, but he couldn’t summon the energy to call her out on it.
Maybe Jennifer had crossed paths with Nell through the council or White Lightning and hadn’t liked her.
He’d ask Nell tomorrow—if he remembered.
Then again, maybe not. Nell viewed her time at White Lightning the way others might view a stint in a grim prison camp.
She never talked about it, and he never pushed.
Joe had returned from wherever he and Dennis had escaped to earlier on, a glaicket-ness to his eyes that suggested one beer too many. While he was not a teetotaller, he rarely drank due to the incompatibility of hangovers with young children. But when he did, he went all in.
It provided the perfect opening. Daniel got to his feet. “Nicky, do you want a lift home?”
She beamed. “Aye, please. This yin’s on his biannual mission tae get hammered, and I’m no’ keen on hangin’ around tae witness it. ‘Specially the bit where he starts singin’.”
Joe looked as if that was the only prompt he needed, and they fled, chortling together. There was little fuss as they left. The others at the table were too busy draining the last of the beer and wine to offer anything more than a half-hearted wave or a distracted “cheerio.”
They made their way to his car. To Daniel’s relief, whatever fleeting attraction had lingered around Nicky earlier had dissipated.
She’d reverted to the Nicky he’d known for over sixteen years—his oldest friend’s partner, her familiar, homely face comforting and her body softly rounded with pregnancy.
Even when she slipped her arm through his, as she had at the start of the evening, nothing stirred, except a faint wistfulness at the sight of her growing belly.
“Joe said you lot are gonnae have a van down at Largs for the Viking festival in August,” Nicky said. “Can I volunteer Kylie to help out?”
Daniel squinted at her. “She’s twelve. Pretty sure that’s breaking child labour laws.”
“No’ if you dinnae pay her,” Nicky replied, a bit too cheerfully for someone offering up their twelve-year-old for unpaid graft.
“If anyone asks, say she’s daein’ work experience.
That yin needs tae learn the clothes on her back and those fancy trainers on her feet dinnae come fae the magic money fairy. ”
“Oh, alright then,” Daniel agreed, wondering what he was taking on. A twelve-year-old who needed constant supervision sounded like more hassle than it was worth—especially one as mouthy as Kylie. He couldn’t imagine her obeying instructions without a full-scale negotiation.
Then it hit him: the first time he’d ‘met’ Kylie, he’d been working at a festival. Fitting—or full circle—that she’d now be ‘volunteering’ for him at one. (Technically volunteering, because the law said she had to be thirteen to work. Semantics.)
Considering what happened shortly after that meeting, he had no desire to dwell on it—made easier by a voice calling out across the car park.
“Hey, Sandwich King!”
He and Nicky turned in unison towards the Marriot’s entrance. Jennifer Frazer waved, her voice cutting through the night air. “Any chance of a lift home, too?”
Nicky jabbed her elbow into his ribs, her voice low and teasing. “She’s a live yin. Bet she’s hopin’ ye drop me aff first, then take her home for a coffee and a knee trembler.”
He nudged her back with mock outrage, his response a hushed, “Behave yourself’,” that only she could hear. Nicky giggled, laughter making her breasts jiggle (delightfully) beneath her dress. He averted his eyes, the last remnants of that earlier madness firmly snuffed out.
Nell had already messaged to say she’d grabbed a taxi home, so there was no harm in doing the gentlemanly thing. Besides, Jennifer might write up his interview even more favourably after a little chivalry.
“Aye, alright then,” he called back. Jennifer hurried over, surprisingly nimble for someone balancing on sky-high heels and fuelled by copious amounts of wine. She cooed over his car, running her hand along the roof as though it were a cat or a dog.
When she moved to claim the passenger seat, he shook his head. “That’s for Nicky.”
She shrugged, unfazed, and slid into the back seat instead, fastening her seatbelt with a click.
Joe and Nicky lived in Springburn, while Jennifer’s flat turned out to be on Glasgow’s south side. It made sense to drop Nicky off first. When they arrived in Springburn, Nicky climbed out, pausing to lean in and wink at him. “Dinnae do anythin’ I wouldnae do…”
She kept her voice low, ensuring Jennifer wouldn’t hear, though it likely wouldn’t have mattered.
Jennifer was too busy wrestling with her seatbelt to notice.
After finally untangling herself, she slid into the now-empty front seat, her perfume wafting through the car and settling in like an unwelcome guest that would overstay its welcome for days.
On the drive to her flat, Jennifer asked a few more questions about Nell, though the earlier edge of hostility seemed to have softened. Her tone was casual, almost curious, and she made no improper suggestions when he pulled up outside her sandstone building.
He exhaled quietly, grateful for the uneventful end to what could have been a very awkward ride.
She got out of the car and leaned into the open window, her scarlet-tipped fingers curling around the doorframe. From this angle, the neckline of her dress gaped, revealing a glimpse of a lacy black bra.
“I need to ask you something,” she said.
Ah. He’d spoken too soon. Was this where she fulfilled Nicky’s prediction?
“Go ahead.” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, hoping the gesture radiated I really need to drive off now vibes.
“Just double-checking—how long did you say you’ve been married? The answer wasn’t clear on the tape, and I can’t remember what you said.”
Her tone didn’t quite ring true. It felt deliberate, as if she remembered perfectly well. And what did the length of his marriage have to do with a profile about his business?
“Twenty years. Been together twenty-two. Met in 1994.”
She raised an eyebrow, her smile faint. “Not many people your age can say that.”
“No,” he replied, keeping his tone neutral.
Her brows arched higher. “And no hiccoughs along the way? No seven-year itches?”
He paused, his fingers stilling on the wheel. What business was it of hers?
“No.” He heard the terseness in his reply.
She straightened, letting go of the door. “Wow, that’s amazing. Anyway, thanks for the lift. See you around.”
And with that, she turned on her heel, disappearing through the front door a few seconds later.
He stayed in place, watching a light flicker on in a first-floor flat. Thinking. No, the Murrays’ marriage hadn’t stumbled on a seven-year itch. But what about the years before that?