Page 29 of From Notting Hill with Love…Actually (Actually #1)

“I thought all that died out when the Internet came along,” I said in a vain attempt to shut him up, or get him on to another topic of conversation.

Will looked stunned that I could even compare the two.

“There will always be a place in our hearts for CB radio, good buddy,” he said, placing his hand on his heart in a dramatic gesture of allegiance.

“But don’t people just use mobile phones now?”

Will sucked in his breath. “Cell phones! They are a blight on humanity! My good buddy, Transit Trev, was just telling me the other day how his…”

I was just about to bang my head on the white tablecloth in front of me when I heard my name spoken. I don’t think I’d ever been so pleased to see David in my whole life .

“David!”

“I thought I’d come over and see how you were doing. Am I interrupting?” he asked, looking at Will.

“No! No, not at all,” I answered before Will could say otherwise.

“Good, good. It seems the formalities are over now, so you can come and join us at our table if you’d like to?” He held his hand out toward a table in the corner of the room.

I sighed with relief. “Yes, I copy you—that’s a big 10-4,” I said as I stood up.

“What?”

“Sorry, I mean yes, I’d love to join you over there, David.”

I turned back to Will and smiled. “Well, good buddy, you got your ears on? It’s time to pull the big switch on you, I’m afraid, because this beaver is over and out!

” I grabbed David before Will recovered from his shock and took up the airwaves once more, and we made our way over to the table he had been sitting at with a few of Felix’s work colleagues.

“Oh my God, was I glad to see you just then,” I said as David found me a chair and I sat down.

I’d once sat through a marathon of trucker movies on one of the lesser-known Sky channels when I’d been off work ill one day.

Who would have thought old Burt Reynolds and Clint Eastwood and his orangutan would have come in so handy one day?

“Was Will entertaining you by any chance, with tales of his CB radio?” a young chap—who I think was called Graham—asked me. “Will’s always good for those.”

“Was he half!” I said, as Graham poured the last remnants of a bottle of wine into a glass for me. “I think sitting next to Hannibal Lecter at dinner would have caused me less pain. ”

The other people around the table laughed.

“Would you like a proper drink?” David asked. “I’m just going up to the bar.”

“Yes, that would be great. I’ll have a large Jack Daniels, please.”

I chatted with the people around the table while David was gone and then glanced around the room.

The hotel staff were beginning to clear the tables, so they could arrange the room into one suitable for dancing to the band that had just arrived and were currently unpacking their instruments up on the stage.

I saw Sean standing talking to a girl who had her back to me. She laughed and when she tossed her hair over her shoulder I caught a glimpse of her face. It was Danielle.

Sean then gestured, would she like a drink? Danielle nodded, Sean took her glass from her and began to make his way toward the bar. He had to pass our table as he did so.

I tried to look like I was deeply engrossed in what the women next to me were saying. They were actually discussing the pros and cons of grocery shopping on the Internet, but I tried hard to look interested in their conversation.

“How’s it going?” Sean asked, as he passed our table.

“Oh, it’s you,” I said, pretending to jump as I turned around.

“Having fun? I saw you got stuck next to ol’ Rubber Duck over there at dinner. I met him at the stag do, interesting guy…”

“About as interesting as watching the National Lottery show without a ticket, yeah. Actually I take that back, even watching it with a ticket is bad enough!”

Sean laughed. “But at least you’ve escaped now. I saw David come over and rescue you. I would have done so myself but…” He looked back at Danielle .

“Yeah, I can see you’ve been busy.”

“Here we go—one large Jack Daniels,” David said, returning with our drinks. He looked with interest at Sean.

“Sean, this is David, my fiancé. David, this is Sean…er…he’s my next-door neighbor in Notting Hill,” I said, not being able to think of a better way of introducing him.

David put the drinks down on the table, and held out his hand to Sean. “Pleased to meet you, Sean.”

“And you too, Dave,” Sean said, shaking David’s hand.

“Id, it’s Dav- id. ”

“Of course, my mistake, sorry.”

There was an awkward silence.

“Well, I’d better go and get some drinks,” Sean said, holding up the empty glasses in his hands. “I’ll see you later perhaps, Scarlett.”

I watched him walk over to the bar before I turned back to David.

“Your neighbor?” he asked, sitting down next to me. “How does your neighbor in Notting Hill know Maddie and Felix?”

“Er…he doesn’t. I invited him to the wedding.”

“You did? Why?”

When I’d told David the little bit about what I’d been up to since I’d been in London, I’d skirted around the Sean issue by saying that the “friend” I’d met up with I’d also been “out and about” with occasionally too.

I took a deep breath and then a large gulp of my drink.

“He’s the friend I was telling you about that I met in London.”

“What friend?” David asked, looking puzzled for a moment. “Wait, you mean the one who you accompanied to a wedding and a dinner party and the opera? ”

I nodded.

“But he’s a man?”

“Yeah, and what of it? Are you saying that men and women can’t be friends?”

Ooh, ooh, When Harry Met Sally , I thought excitedly—storing that one up to add to my ever-growing list of proof. But I kept the thought to myself—I didn’t think now was really the time to be sharing my latest finding with David.

“No, but I mean…I just thought he was a girl, that’s all.”

“Nope, Sean’s definitely not a girl,” I said, as a vision of him emerging from the shower last night floated into my head.

“Don’t be facetious with me, Scarlett, I can see that.” David looked over to where Sean stood at the bar. “I saw him wink at you in the castle earlier.”

“I know,” I said, trying hard to focus on David again.

“And?”

“And what, David? Are you telling me that because a man winks at me it means I’m having an affair with him?”

“No, but…”

Sean walked back across the floor with two drinks in his hand. He winked at me as he passed.

I half smiled back, but then I noticed David frowning at me.

“Look, David, Sean is just a friend, I promise you, nothing more. Anyway, if I was having an affair with him do you think he’d be over there chatting up Danielle?”

David looked to where Danielle and Sean were now sitting next to each other, their heads close together as they laughed at a private joke.

I felt a twinge in my stomach. This time one of the Olympic athletes—who had been performing their workouts with my stomach—felt like they had torn a muscle, ripped a tendon, or sustained some other career-threatening injury.

I looked away. “Well, do you?” I asked him again.

“I’m sorry,” David said, taking my hands in his. “You know how jealous I get when I see you with other men.”

“It’s fine,” I said, deliberately not looking Sean’s way again. “At least I know you care.”

And at this precise moment, David, for once I understand exactly how you’re feeling…