Page 31 of The Retreat

Talia shut the bathroom door behind her and turned the lock with trembling fingers. She leaned against the sink, breathing hard.

What the hell had just happened?

She turned the tap on and bent to splash water on her face like that would help. Like this was a normal morning and not one where she’d just sleep-invaded her fake girlfriend’s bed.

‘OK,’ she muttered to herself. ‘Let’s talk this through. You were asleep. You didn’t mean to. You’re not a predator. You’re just a lunatic.’

That helped. She clutched the edges of the sink and breathed. ‘Calm down,’ she commanded her heart.

She hadn’t sleepwalked in years. Not since she was twenty-one and living in a student house. She’d started waking up in weird places: the kitchen, the fire escape, and on one particularly memorable occasion, at the foot of her flatmate’s bed holding a jar of peanut butter.

But she’d outgrown that. Or willed it to stop. Either way, it had been done. Until now.

Apparently, the perfect trigger was a weekend of corporate surveillance and a fake romance.

But why couldn’t she have woken up in the bath or even out in the woods? Oh, to have come to sitting in sheep shit. How preferable that would have been to literally gravitating to Imogen in her sleep.

Maybe her subconscious was just deeply committed to the plan.

She groaned and let her forehead fall forward against the mirror with a solid thunk.

The worst part was the moment after she’d woken, but before she realised what she was doing. The feel of Imogen’s body, warm under the covers. The scent of her. She’d smelled so fucking good. Talia had liked holding her.

She stomped in a circle on the cold tile. Reflexive, furious pacing. Like she could outrun the memory of how soft and startled and suspiciously pretty Imogen looked in the early light. How her voice sounded when it was husky with sleep. Talia had never heard her speak like that before.

But these were physical things. This was not a feelings thing.

A stupid, messy slip-up from a brain that didn’t know how to be normal under pressure.

‘OK. New rules,’ she muttered. ‘No physical contact. No lingering eye contact. No talking after 10 p.m. And if possible, no sleeping. Strap feet together with a belt if necessary.’

With that determined, she felt better. Slightly. She decided that if she was in the bathroom, she’d better do bathroom things.

She peed, brushed her teeth, and showered. Then she moisturised, did her makeup, and brushed her hair. After she’d checked a shoulder mole she was tracking, she had run out of things to do.

She couldn’t hide in here all morning. Eventually, she’d have to face the woman she’d non-consensually cuddled.

This was fine. She was fine. If anyone could spin this, it was her. She’d once closed a deal so messy it took three NDAs, a forty-page appendix, and a paralegal who cried in the loos halfway through.

She squared her shoulders. Tried to pull herself together. But her reflection still looked haunted.

She wasn’t spiralling. She was just a little off balance. And maybe she hadn’t realised until now how close she was to tipping over the edge. Of what, she wasn’t prepared to name.

But it had Imogen’s face.

She unlocked the door and stepped back out into the room. Imogen was up now, standing there holding her toiletry bag. ‘Why don’t I see you down at breakfast?’ she said, unzipping the bag and looking into it.

‘Sure,’ Talia said gladly.

Imogen passed her and went into the bathroom. Talia dressed quickly and got the hell out of the crime scene.