Page 32 of Hit For Six (Balls and Banter #1)

CHAPTER TWENTY

Monty

‘Well, that was a memorable first date.’

Monty burst out of The Iris, frantically looking from left to right to find Lola slanted against the wall separating one eatery from another.

It made for a very different painting to the version of her propped up against the oak.

She’d gone from carefree and full of life to paranoid and exhausted in just a couple of hours.

Equally as beautiful but this was no time for complimenting her looks.

He needed to pull out all the stops to turn things around.

Which was nigh on impossible when he was out of ideas.

Their moments of banter had been fabulous.

The right kind of bubbles where everybody around them had ceased to exist.

‘Except it wasn’t a date, Monty.’

And now his expectations were fading by the second.

‘Slip of the tongue.’ He caught his breath and took a tentative step towards her, relief coursing his veins that Lola had waited.

It was something. ‘That was so intense back there that I don’t know what I’m saying.

I was beyond worried about you. Are you sure you’re okay?

I mean, obviously you’re not going to be feeling on top of the world but–’

‘I… can’t be taken anywhere, as I very recently warned you. Here you are smack bang in another déjà-vu. But thank you, anyway. The food and drink were delicious.’

He waited for her to say the same thing about the company.

‘It was nothing. Any time.’ Lola bit her lip and Monty knew she was trying to stem the tears.

He held out an arm, wanting nothing more than to hold her close to him, to press his lips to her forehead and promise her that everything was going to be okay.

But she trudged ahead, ignoring his chivalry.

It hurt but he couldn’t show it. ‘Let me walk you home. No more buses.’

‘Okay,’ she conceded reluctantly but without biting.

‘It could have easily been me,’ he prattled on.

‘And as an aside to that, most people back in The Iris would have been half-cut on the vino. Poe-faced cream suit dude was not a cross-section of the culinary demographic tonight.’ Lola remained silent.

‘I think you care too much what other people think.’

Now she pouted and Monty was petrified that he’d overstepped the mark.

Once again, he found himself being a hypocrite.

He was a fine one to talk, letting his parents mold certain parts of his life.

But he had to try to get Lola to say something.

Somehow. They passed the Irish pub and he wished he could take her inside for a nightcap.

‘Baileys or an Irish coffee?’ he chanced, his imagination stoking the embers of their connection.

Lola continued to skulk along, head down.

It was no surprise that he’d been rejected.

Admittedly, she looked a bit of a mess after what had happened.

Her lipstick had smudged and her mascara had streaked down her face from the eye-watering experience of his thrusting.

Yes, he wanted to be able to say he’d enjoyed such intimacy with Lola but in slightly different circumstances.

Her scruffy appearance didn’t matter, though and he’d be ecstatic to hold her hand anywhere. She was imperfectly perfect to Monty.

He stopped in the middle of the street and readjusted his cricket bag straps. His shoulders were killing him. It was pathetic and suggested that he needed to get back into the gym. Like yesterday. He let out a weary sigh.

‘I’m all for companionable golden silence but it feels like we’ve had an argument or something.’

‘How do you expect me to talk after that?’ Lola hissed, as if doing so would prevent anyone else in the city from catching on to recent events.

‘My behaviour was a disgrace. I can’t even master basic etiquette, and I’m too sad that we had to forgo dessert.

I ruined everything! You can dress it up however you like but there’s no point trying to make me feel better. I just need to go home and wallow.’

Fair enough. Monty needed to put himself in Lola’s shoes.

It was an absolute bummer that they hadn’t seen through all of those courses when the conversation had been so open, enlightening, and quite unlike any meal he’d ever shared with a woman.

He’d truly been on the verge of spilling the beans about his current career dilemma too.

No mean feat when the very topic made him feel nauseous.

All of this said, he really needed to labour his point now.

‘How many times, Lola? It totally wasn’t your fault. These things probably happen once a week in every café and restaurant in Bath. We’ll go somewhere else next weekend–’

‘Stay away from me.’

‘It’s too late for that!’

They faced one another off, Monty stepping back from the curb onto the road.

He meant every word, though. If friendship was the only thing on the table, he realised after these precious few hours with Lola, that he’d take it and treasure it.

He could probably manage that. Just about.

Until she got together with another guy, when his heart would shatter.

Lola was the first to look away. Was this her brand of surrender?

When it felt safe, Monty mounted the pavement again, where they went back to their silent stride through the city.

He didn’t dare windowshop or comment on the swathes of tourists doing the Bridgerton evening tour.

Dressed in their fancy Regency costumes, they even had Monty convinced that they were the real deal, until their hotchpotch of German, Chinese and Canadian accents gave them away.

Eventually they crossed the road and skirted the Guildhall, Monty praying that Lola wouldn’t change her mind and jump on a bus to Timbuktu.

Thankfully, she carried on, although her strides seemed even longer now, such was her rush to get home.

Monty and his tortoise shell kept pace as he pondered other possible reasons for him and Lola to get together.

But his only hope was a spot of future Squiffy sitting.

Which was looking increasingly unlikely.

Lola would probably fork out for a pro and be done with it.

‘What the? H-how did we end up here ?’

He came to a halt at the pavement’s edge, foolishly voicing his thoughts aloud. He’d genuinely forgotten that their route back to her place would take them past the landmarks of that night . He was pretty sure they’d both forgotten, when he sneaked a side glance at Lola’s startled face.

It was still light. He loved these summer nights when a good day seemed to go on forever.

And it had been the best of days. Up until it had gone disastrously wrong.

They should be all over one another now, FFS.

But here he was lugging a cumbersome load around the city, his hands stuffed in his pockets for fear of getting anything else wrong.

How had his carefully constructed plans for the evening fallen down on him house of cards-style?

He’d been over confident. Lola had called him cocky in the park.

She was right. There were many things in life that money couldn’t buy.

Lola Smith was one of them. Not that she was an object, of course. Lightyears from it.

The more he thought, the more certain he was that something about his business idea had triggered Lola.

Now Monty was all out racking his brains as they stood transfixed at the sight of Pulteney Bridge, and he tried to remember the way he’d phrased his announcement.

Surely nothing about his travel company idea would have set off Lola’s SPD?

He’d read up on the symptoms again when he got home.

‘Just a bit of a déjà vu!’ he tried to break the ice as the pedestrians milled around them.

‘They seem to be in the air tonight.’

Lola sighed and Monty followed her gaze to the weir beneath the bridge.

Its thunder could be heard from metres away but tonight it looked mesmerising, the last spangles of the sun bouncing off its millpond surface before adding little sparkles to the cascading water.

If Monty was into taking shots for Instagram, he’d bound over there now, camera ready to manipulate the moment.

Actually, that wasn’t a bad idea. A desperate one, perhaps.

But Lola didn’t know that he wasn’t an Insta fanatic.

‘I… don’t think I’ve ever seen it looking so dramatic. Look! There’s a rainbow coming off the haze and everything. I’ve got to take a picture, Lola. Are you coming?’

He offered his hand and took a deep breath.

Amazingly, Lola held it and Monty tried to ignore the thrill of her touch as he led them to the perfect spot for his photoshoot– which just happened to be at the precise coordinates of their near kiss.

Her fingers slipped away as soon as they reached the other side of the road.

But Monty feigned indifference, dumping his bag to kneel by the wall.

Last chance saloon-style, he pulled his phone from his pocket, propping his elbows on the rough surface of the wall so he could angle himself to take a snap.

Unlike his T20 shots, he wasn’t the best at capturing things on a screen– moving or otherwise.

Hopefully Lola wouldn’t ask to see his handiwork.

‘So, then.’ She coughed. ‘How come I haven’t witnessed you standing over dining tables to upload gourmet meals and snazzy cocktails to your grid, considering all the delectable things we ate and drank tonight?

You don’t seem to be fussed about capturing arty angles of your cricket practice either.

And I hope you’ve not been parading Squiffy on your socials after sending me those selfies? ’

Shit. No, not about the cat. He’d never take the liberty.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

Monty whistled annoyingly out the side of his mouth.