Page 36

Lori

I hitched a lift back to the guys’ hotel with the swannies, hating that I was nervous. I wished I was just sneaking in to spend time with him – or even going on some wild scheme to get my luck back.

But no, I was here on behalf of my dad.

I was in full support of Dad’s proposal: a contract extension for next year.

I might even have suggested it, if Dad hadn’t beaten me to it.

But the timing was off. Seb was still mad at me, even though he’d kissed me as though his world depended on it.

I hadn’t had enough time to convince him to stay and he’d sent that ominous: we have to talk .

I hated to admit how many times that message had caught and hung in my brain during the race today.

He hadn’t replied to my ‘where are you’ message, so I asked one of the guys in the lobby which one was his room and banged on the door. When it flew open to reveal Colin, I took a step back in surprise.

‘What are you— Er, hi brotato chip. Nice win today. You finally managed to finish something.’

‘You can’t fool me, brat. I know you’re here looking to…’ He gagged before he’d finished his sentence. ‘Actually, I don’t want to know what you and Frankie get up to.’

I rolled my eyes. ‘Are you two roommates?’

‘Most of the time,’ he said with a shrug. ‘For someone you’re just messing with, you text him a lot.’

After three months in Northern Europe my tan had faded, meaning Colin must have seen the blush creeping up my neck. ‘Maybe there are lots of girls messing with him.’

‘With Frankie?’ Colin said with an amused grin. ‘Nope. Besides, I know when it’s you who’s texted him because he turns into a puppy and he can’t stop smiling.’

My stomach dipped and I kind of wished I hadn’t heard that. ‘Where is he? I need to… mess with him a little more.’

‘Yuck, I said I didn’t want to know!’

Stifling a groan, I countered, ‘I didn’t say I wanted to tie him up and give him a lap dance. Get over it. I need to talk to him about something. That’s all.’ I was too restless and annoyed even to enjoy the view of Colin gaping, incapable of speech for a moment.

‘Is everything all right?’ he asked.

‘Yes!’

‘You’re not wearing your earrings,’ he commented.

‘I lost them back in March,’ I said, confused at the change of subject.

‘Did Mum give those ones to you?’

‘Years ago, but why are you suddenly interested?’

‘What about that necklace? I don’t remember that either.’

I tucked it self-consciously under my shirt. ‘You obviously haven’t been paying attention.’

He watched me more closely than I liked. ‘Lori,’ he began, his tone setting off alarm bells in my mind, ‘you know if you need anything—’

‘I don’t. I’m fine. You never used to ask me if I needed anything before I got pins in my vertebrae!’

‘All right. Take it easy. I get the message. Frankie’s probably—’

‘I’m here. What’s up? Lori!’

I turned to find him emerging into the corridor from the lifts, holding a cardboard box.

‘I thought the women were staying in Bastogne and I didn’t… I wasn’t sure I’d see you.’

‘She needs to talk to you,’ Colin supplied. ‘Talk,’ he repeated, enunciating clearly. Although I suspected he was trying to deliver a veiled threat, it only made me think about what Colin thought we wanted to do with each other. I kind of wished I’d booked a hotel room to drag him to.

‘Come on,’ I said, grasping Seb’s sleeve and dragging him back into the lift.

When the doors finally closed, I sighed deeply – and picked up the most spectacular smell.

Straightening, I sniffed curiously. Did the cheap hotel have a signature scent like the Ritz?

Or did they pump out something delicious to disguise the odour of old cyclists’ socks and sweaty bibs?

‘It’s this,’ Seb said, holding the box under my nose. ‘Vanilla.’

‘Vanilla what?’

He placed the box in my hands. ‘Waffle.’

‘God, I love Belgium,’ I murmured, enjoying his chuckle as I opened the box to find a rustic-looking waffle, glistening with sugar and doused in vanilla sauce that might be nearly as good as custard, since no one in continental Europe appreciated the magic of custard.

I broke off a piece with the little wooden fork and chewed slowly, not caring if my moan would make the CCTV sound X-rated.

‘Good thing I bought it for you,’ Seb commented.

‘You bought it for me?’ I mumbled around another mouthful.

‘No. I was joking.’

‘You didn’t have to share it with me!’

‘Sharing? Is that what we’re doing?’

Giving him a dirty look, I cut off another piece and shoved it into his mouth, dripping vanilla sauce onto his chin. He swiped it up with his thumb and even that fizzed in places that it shouldn’t have.

‘Well, this is romantic. How about you take a photo for—’ I shoved another piece in to shut him up.

I obviously hadn’t had enough to eat after the race – or maybe it was just a really slow lift – because the waffle was almost gone by the time the doors opened three floors below.

Hotels were a constant problem for my dad – well, money was a constant problem.

Rooms booked up years in advance and the hiked-up prices for teams around the time of an event meant that the guys were staying in a two-star hotel above a bar, while the mechanics and technical staff struggled to find somewhere to park the bus and the trailer of bikes.

But the women were in an equally crappy hotel in the countryside somewhere near Bastogne where there weren’t even any waffles, so I suspected the men had the better deal.

Outside the hotel, the evening was dim, despite the longer days of spring. I tugged my jacket around myself as a gust blew through it. The cathedral loomed dark across the square, all turrets and gothic arches, but we wandered in another direction.

He spoke first. ‘So we have to talk. I kind of thought we weren’t finished when you rushed off today.’

I didn’t want to talk. I just wanted to wander aimlessly through the paved streets of Liège – and finally hold his hand.

‘What do you need to talk about? I won’t touch your social media again. I shouldn’t have intruded.’

He swiped his tongue thoughtfully over his lip and I indulged in the spark that went through me at the sight. ‘Apology accepted.’

‘That’s it?’

‘Apparently.’ He shot me a half-smile that I wanted to catch and bottle.

My heart soared for a moment, imagining we could do the wandering and hand-holding thing now and forget the ‘talk’. I could do Dad’s bidding another time.

But then he continued. ‘I thought we had to talk about… the publicity stunt relationship and when we need a fake break-up.’

That sent my heart plummeting again.

‘Ah, that stuff.’

‘Did you need to talk to me about something else?’

‘How are your Instagram woes? Is that why you want a fake break-up?’ I asked, avoiding the topic a little longer.

‘I didn’t say I wanted to fake break up. I just assumed we’d have to end it as soon as you got back in form.’

‘Well, that hasn’t happened yet.’

‘But if you ever want to fake break up, then just let me know. I can post something for my people and you can post something for your people and our people can talk to other people and we’ll get the message out that we’re still friends.’

‘Still friends,’ I said, needing those words more each time we repeated them.

‘Oh, look. A waffle shop. We’d better just stop here and buy me another waffle, since my first one got stolen.’

I whacked him on the arm. ‘You are such a pushover! Letting strange girls hack your Insta and steal your waffles.’

His side-eye was amusing as he ignored me in favour of the waffle stand. He came away with another of the crispy sort covered in sugar, but this one also had chocolate oozing out of the inside. My mouth watered as he took a bite, licking his finger when the sauce dripped.

I sidled close. ‘You know I gave you a few bites of… your waffle.’

‘Only two.’

‘Well…’ I lifted my chin.

‘Am I getting you into trouble?’ he asked. ‘Waffles aren’t exactly in the approved diet.’

‘First you introduce me to waffles, then it’s a slippery slope all the way to cheese.’

He gave me a withering look. ‘Something like that. We’ve established that I’m bad for you.’

‘Maybe I want bad. I definitely want a bit of that waffle.’

With a sigh, he held it out for me. Shooting him a sly smile, I opened my mouth wide and took the biggest bite I could manage, chewing and licking my lips until he was staring, slack-jawed, at my mouth.

‘Everything you do turns me on,’ he said accusingly. ‘Especially with your mouth.’

‘Mmmm,’ I said, wiping a drop of sauce off my lips and sucking on my fingertip. ‘The chocolate kind of exploded in my mouth.’

He gave a faint sound like a whimper from deep in his throat. ‘You do realise I have to go back to my twin room with your brother,’ he said, his voice high.

‘Urgh, that is rough luck.’

A few drops of rain landed on his shoulders, then I felt them in my hair and it struck me just how grim the sky looked now and how far from the hotel we’d wandered – without me even broaching the subject of his contract. Maybe we’d find a place in the lobby of the hotel, or the bar downstairs.

‘Shall we head back?’ he asked.

He reached back for my hand when I nodded – and then obviously realised what he’d done and snatched it back.

My throat was thick with the loss of whatever that moment could have been and maybe it would all be better if neither of us had been pro cyclists, if he’d just been that middle-class Canadian I’d pictured and I’d been…

That was the problem. I didn’t know who I was without a bike.

We headed swiftly back through town, but the intensity of the rain increased steadily until I was shivering. We were still across the square from the hotel when the downpour began.

‘Over here!’ Seb called over the rain and tugged me by the sleeve to the entrance of the cathedral, where we ducked into the stone passageway to the main portal, gazing out into the wet. The rain fell in sheets, but a smile stole over my lips as the back of my hand brushed his.

He glanced at me, catching the smile, and the corners of his eyes crinkled and the bursting sensation in my chest spread again.

The door to the cathedral opened to reveal a middle-aged couple in matching bucket hats – and a hint of warm light from the interior. As the couple exclaimed about the rain in French, I drifted towards the doors, peering in and – wow.

The gothic vaults were illuminated by numerous chandeliers, the sandstone ribs glowing gold. The most astonishing thing was that the vaults were painted with a forest of colours – plants and trees and animals.

Seb folded the cardboard packaging of his waffle and followed me warily inside. ‘You don’t think there will be any severed heads in here, do you?’

‘They’re not going to jump out at you. If you get scared, you can hold my hand.’ I cringed, but it was too late to call the words back.

I brushed past him into the church, staring up at the vaults and the glowing colours of the stained glass struck by the dim evening light.

My gaze was drawn to a bright marble sculpture of a muscular man with lush curls and a pair of articulated bat wings.

The crease between his eyebrows reminded me of Seb’s wary expression – and his muscles reminded me of the skin and sinew under his clothes that I probably wouldn’t get to see tonight, damn it.

‘He’s a handsome devil,’ I commented lightly.

‘He’s the devil, I think. Tempted?’

‘Very,’ I joked, taking slow steps further along the nave.

Seb fell into step beside me, his throat working. ‘I’m kind of glad we don’t have to fake break-up today – in case I get scared of the haunted relics. But did you really come back just so I could get mad at you?’

Shit, I couldn’t even lie in a church – and I was worried about losing touch with reality anyway, with everything we were faking. With a sigh, I stuffed my hands in my pockets and turned away, gathering my wits to say what I needed to say.

‘Actually, there is another reason.’ I paused, as though that could make my next comment less bad. ‘It’s about your retirement. Dad wants you to stay.’