Chapter Seventeen
Riley drove to Megan’s apartment as soon as she finished work the next day, anxious to discuss the incident at Briar’s apartment and get Megan’s opinion, perhaps even her assurance that what she’d done wasn’t so bad. It had been playing on her mind for much of the day and she’d dealt with alternating feelings of guilt and remorse that refused to shift. She wanted to see Megan anyway, just to check that she was ok. Her friend had texted to say she had a head cold and couldn’t make tonight’s Thursday evening dinner date but Riley was nearly certain there was more to it than a simple cold. Megan rarely allowed common ailments to get her down and she seldom cancelled a night out.
She stopped at the convenience store near Megan’s apartment to buy a bunch of gerberas. Their last conversation had ended badly and Megan had always loved the bright, cheerful flowers. She added a box of chocolates at the last minute, picturing Megan’s face when she gave them to her. She’d been a bad friend to both Megan and Briar, and it was time to attempt to make up for her shortcomings.
Riley had just paid for the luminous, artificially pink flowers and the box of ridiculously expensive chocolates when her phone pinged. Thinking it might be Megan with a change of mind about dinner, she opened the text box without first glancing at the screen. ‘I’ve missed you. Jack.’
Her mind still firmly on Megan, she had to read it twice before the message registered. Jack. Her resolutely loyal wrong number. She’d forgotten all about him over the past few days as the realities of her daily life became more challenging. The message brought a brief smile to her face but she had no inclination to reply. The odd note that Lucy had handed her at work drifted into her thoughts. Let sleeping dogs lie.
Megan lived near the edge of the inner city, on the jagged demarcation line between the central city and the first straggly reaches of suburbia. It wasn’t until Riley was standing outside her door and listening to the peal of the doorbell that she stopped to wonder if her friend was home. Yes, she knew Megan well enough to know that the text to say she couldn’t make their dinner date was a blatant excuse, but what if Megan had sent the excuse so she could take up another invitation instead? She had hinted that there might a new love interest on the scene, although she had been uncharacteristically coy about sharing the details.
Riley tucked the box of chocolates under her arm, juggled the flowers and her handbag in her other hand, and pushed the doorbell once more. The closed door felt like a metaphor for the state of her current relationship with her longtime friend. Her phone pinged again, twice in quick succession, and she was about to check it to see if it was Megan when the door suddenly swung open.
Megan, her face wrung with bewilderment, stared out at her. She was wearing comfortable, casual clothes and no makeup and there was the faintest trace of red around one of her nostrils. She looked carelessly rumpled rather than flu ravaged. “Riley. What are you doing here?”
“I brought these over to cheer you up.” Riley thrust the flowers at Megan and fumbled for the chocolates. “I’m sorry. I’m a terrible friend. Do you forgive me?”
Megan held the flowers and chocolates awkwardly, staring down at them as if she wasn’t sure what to do with them. She didn’t move from the doorway nor did she invite Riley inside.
Riley hopped from one foot to the other. “I saw Dan the other day,” she said quickly, afraid that Megan might retreat and shut the door in her face. “I bumped into him at a coffee shop near the office.”
“Dan...” Megan frowned, as if she was struggling to put a face to the name.
“Yes. I told him that I’d tell you he was asking after you.” She looked hard at Megan. “How are you feeling?”
Megan still looked dazed. “How am I feeling?”
“Yes, your cold. Are you feeling better?”
“Oh.” Her face cleared and she stood straighter, appearing to come to her senses all at once. “Much better, thanks. Do you want to come in? I swear I’m not contagious.” She smiled and stood aside, opening the door wide to allow Riley to enter.
“I was worried that you were mad at me.”
“Mad at you? Why would you think that? These flowers are beautiful! You’re such a sweetheart.” Megan led the way over to the kitchen, where she placed the flowers and chocolates on the counter and began searching for a vase in the cupboard above the sink. “How was your sleepover with Briar?”
“It was... interesting.” Riley sat her handbag on the counter as her phone pinged again. “Oh hang on, let me check my messages. It’s probably just Jack again.”
“Jack? Who’s Jack?”
“Some guy messaged me a few days ago, a wrong number who dialed my phone by mistake, and we’ve been chatting on and off ever since. He’s surprisingly charming and considerate, which is the only reason I’ve allowed it to continue.” Disappointingly, the text she had just received was a generic announcement from her telecom provider detailing the availability of a new mobile phone plan. She deleted it and opened the first of the two messages from Unknown Number to read out loud. “‘Do you have much planned for your evening? Jack.’ I think he’s bored.”
Megan looked pained as she arranged the flowers in the vase. “Why are you encouraging him? He’s probably some weirdo texting you in his underpants from his basement. He probably skins cats for a hobby.”
“I don’t get that feeling about him.” She opened the next message and her eyes widened. “Hey, listen to this! ‘I’ll be working on my Japanese language lessons. Sayonara for now, Jack.’”
Megan snorted. “I suppose you’re going to tell me now that this is some sort of fated connection between the two of you? Two wrong numbers who were always destined to meet?”
“You’re not usually so cynical. It’s just a bit of fun. Don’t you think it’s intriguing that he’s learning Japanese too? Should I reply to him?”
“Just ignore him. Do you want a glass of wine?” Megan had the refrigerator door open and was already reaching for a bottle.
“Sure, why not?” Disregarding Megan’s advice, she tapped in a response. ‘I love Japan! I’m spending the evening with a friend. Riley.’
“Did you text him back?” Megan frowned her displeasure as she passed Briar a glass filled dangerously close to the brim.
Riley hurriedly turned her phone over to lay it face down on the counter. “There’s nothing wrong with me being friendly. It’s not going to go anywhere.” She took the glass from Megan’s hand and followed her through to the living room.
Megan settled herself down on one end of the sofa while Riley took the other end. Megan’s apartment was understated rather than cluttered, the rooms and decor holding hints of her personality rather than drowning beneath the force of it, and Riley had always felt comfortable here.
“You said your sleepover with Briar was interesting. What was so interesting about it?”
“She’s a twin. I didn’t know because she’s never mentioned it.” Riley chose not to say yet that it was only through prying that she’d found out herself. “She said her brother was hit by a car when they were two and he didn’t survive the accident. It’s so sad, especially as she blames herself.”
“How could a two-year-old be at fault for anything?”
“She said she unlatched the gate and he ran out onto the road.” Riley pursed her lips and rested her wine glass on her bent knee. It was time to confess. “I looked through her private stuff and found some old photos. She’s angry with me for snooping and I think my behavior has threatened our friendship. I know I was in the wrong.”
Megan fiercely held her gaze. “You shouldn’t have done that. You shouldn’t have looked through her private things and you probably shouldn’t have told me what you found. People are entitled to their secrets, and they’re entitled to expect loyalty from their friends. For the first time ever, I might have to agree with Briar.”
“Ok, ok, I said I was in the wrong.” Riley quickly moved on, disconcerted by Megan’s open disapproval. “She s
leepwalks too, which was a surprise. She said it started when she was a kid. She said her brothers teased her and they often played pranks on her. She hinted that one of the pranks led to the sleepwalking but she shut down when I tried to find out more. I have one of her brother’s business cards. He works at a car yard.” She got up to retrieve it from her handbag, resisting the urge to flip her phone over to see if Jack had replied to her message. She returned to her seat in the living room, turning the small white card around and around in her fingers. “I’d like to contact him but I don’t know what I would say to him. Briar is already angry with me. I don’t know how she’ll react when she discovers that I’ve contacted her brother behind her back.”
“Let sleeping dogs lie, Riley.”
Riley’s head jerked up. “What?”
“It’s an old saying. My grandmother was fond of using it. She had hundreds of them that she rolled out whenever she wanted to put her grandchildren in their place.”
“Did you phone me on the company number the other day and leave a message?”
Morgan’s confusion appeared genuine. “Why would I phone you on the company number rather than calling your mobile?”
“Hmmm.” Riley pensively tapped the business card against the side of her wine glass. “I need to apologize to Briar. She was so upset when I left. I called her today from work but she didn’t pick up and her voicemail was switched off so I couldn’t leave a message.”
Morgan sneezed suddenly, startling them both. Riley jumped up to grab a box of tissues from the sideboard. She passed them to her friend and patted her sympathetically on the shoulder. “You really aren’t well. I should go and let you have an early night.”
“Stay and have your wine first. I’m glad you came over.” Morgan’s voice was muffled and her eyes red from behind a wad of tissues. “You’re a real friend, Riley.”
Riley grinned. “So I’m forgiven?”
“Always. You know I’ve never been able to stay mad at you for long.”
Chapter Eighteen
Riley dropped a thin sheath of papers down on Paul’s desk, the documents neatly collated and held together with a bulldog clip. “That’s the last of the paperwork for the Kinley account.”
“Great.” He reached across the desk to pick up the documents, revealing a deep, angry-looking scratch on the top of one hand.
“What have you been doing to yourself?”
“What?” He looked up and then down again as he followed the direction of her gaze. “Oh, that.” He moved his hand down onto his lap, out of sight beneath the lip of the desk. “I was trimming the rose bushes at home and snagged my skin.”
“You need to be careful. Injuries from rose thorns are notorious for becoming infected. A scratch can turn nasty very quickly.”
“Sporotrichosis.” He smiled at her startled expression. “Rose picker’s disease. Yes, I know all about that.”
“Do you have many rose bushes?” This was a strangely normal conversation for her to be having with the usually stuttering, stammering, or belligerent Paul.
His grin grew wider. “A few. I’m lucky enough to have a large patch of garden at my disposal and it allows me to indulge in rose growing as a hobby. I won an award last summer.”
“You did? How lovely.” She returned his smile, amazed at the animation in his face and the unfamiliar confidence in his tone.
“Just a small one,” he said modestly. “Something to use as a bookend.”
“I’m impressed. You obviously have green fingers. Congratulations.”
Paul straightened his shoulders, blossoming like one of his rose bushes under her smile, and she gave him another grin before returning to her desk to collect her handbag. Today she would use her lunch break to look for Briar and apologize in person. She’d called her number several times but as yet, she had been unable to leave a message. She had texted too of course, but Briar had not replied.
She passed Lucy at the front desk, who was intently focused on a phone call and didn’t look up, and left the office. It was a bleak, cold day and the clouds hung low and oppressive in the sky. A loud thump to one side of the building caught her attention and she looked across to see Colin’s body hanging half in and half out of one of the dumpsters. “Colin? What are you doing?”
He shoved himself backwards out of the dumpster and gave her one of his compulsory glares as he dusted off the sleeves of his suit. “I threw something away that I should have kept. I was looking for it.” He turned away from her and fumbled in his pocket for his cigarettes.
Riley made a face at his stiff, dark-suited back. She pulled her scarf out of her bag and wrapped it warmly around her neck as she walked out onto the street. Briar hadn’t told her of the location of the construction site where she was working, but it was an ideal day for a brisk walk around the neighborhood. The exercise would do her good, especially after spending the morning with her thoughts tied up with figures and spreadsheets.
The first construction site was two blocks away. Someone wolf-whistled as she approached but she pointedly ignored the catcall. She scanned over the workers, receiving several interest stares in return, but she couldn’t see Briar’s glossy brown hair and physically fit feminine figure amongst them. A man with his thick tattooed arms left bare despite the chill of the day called out something crude, garnering a chorus of hoots and jeers from his co-workers, and Riley hurriedly walked on.
She didn’t find Briar until she reached the third construction site, by which time she was ready to give up and go back to work. She almost didn’t recognize her friend at first, as she’d been looking for a figure in an orange vest. Instead, Briar was dressed in a long black overcoat with her nametag clipped to the breast pocket. She was standing next to a pile of framing timber studying a clipboard and she didn’t notice Riley as she approached.
“Briar.”
Briar turned with a comment poised on her lips, clearly expecting to see someone else. She instantly froze when she saw Riley. She took a wary step backwards, her eyes narrowed and her full lips unsmiling. “What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to see you. To apologize again. I had no right to do what I did. I’ve tried phoning you but I couldn’t get an answer.” Riley looked at her helplessly, hoping for a glimmer of congeniality but still there was nothing. “I’ve been trawling through every construction site I could find between my office and here.”
“You know my job keeps me mobile.” Briar inserted her pen through the steel hoops on the clipboard and looked past her, over to where a couple of construction workers were filling a wheelbarrow with wet cement. “I’m in the middle of something,” she said shortly.
“I understand but... Briar, I really am sorry.”
Briar sighed and faced her again, holding her hair out of her eyes with one hand as a sudden wind picked up and bullied the site dust into tiny troublesome whirlwinds. “I don’t like it when we fight.”
Riley grabbed at her scarf as the wind caught it and threatened to tear it away. “It wasn’t really a fight. I did something that I shouldn’t have done and you reacted accordingly.” She tried for a smile, carefully watching Briar’s face for a response. “Friends?”
“Your scarf is caught on your necklace.” Briar’s pretty face loomed disconcertingly close. Riley was enveloped with the not unpleasant scent of clean perspiration and musk as Briar worked to untangle the chain from the weave of the knitted scarf. “There.” Briar tucked the freed necklace and pendant back inside Riley’s scarf and moved away again. “Yes, of course we’re friends.”
“You might want to switch your voicemail on. It’s not connected. You could be missing important messages.”
“I purposely switched it off. I didn’t want to...,” Briar’s attention had shifted and she was again watching the men with the wheelbarrow. Without warning, she raised her voice to shout, “Larry! Don’t overfill it! The last thing I need is to have the Health & Safety guys on my back!”
“Look, you’re busy. I can se
e that. I just wanted to make sure that everything was ok between us.” Riley impulsively leaned in to kiss Briar’s cheek. “Talk soon, ok?”
“We will.” Another mischievous gust of wind threw Briar’s hair back across her eyes and she tossed her head to flick it out of the way so she could continue watching the men. “I should go. Those two guys are an accident waiting to happen.”
Still Riley hesitated. “Are you sleeping ok? Are you still concerned about someone poking around the apartment?”
Now she had Briar’s full attention. “I was up and walking around the apartment again last night. I woke up in the kitchen. I think I was about to put the kettle on the stove.”
Riley frowned. “That sounds dangerous. Do you think you should talk to someone about the sleepwalking? A therapist or a doctor or someone like that?”
“No. Hey, thanks for coming over today, Riley. It means a lot to me.” She smiled for the first time and said something else, although her words were lost in the crackling noise of a loose, flapping tarpaulin and the shouts of the men with the wheelbarrow. “Gotta go.”
Riley set off back to the office, satisfied that her errand had been successful. Her friendships were now back on an even keel, but she was concerned about Briar’s sleepwalking. Should she call her brother for a discreet chat? Was he aware of the severity of his sister’s nocturnal habits? Perhaps he thought she’d outgrown it. Briar certainly wasn’t broadcasting the news that she suffered from the condition. Did her family know? Briar hadn’t mentioned if her mother was still alive or a part of her life and she’d said her father was absent during her childhood. Perhaps Matt was the sibling to whom she remained the closest. Should she call him? She was wary of overstepping the mark again but wasn’t it her responsibility as Briar’s friend to be supportive and caring, to make sure that the right people knew what was going on in her life?
Riley delved into her handbag as she walked over the crosswalk near Smith & Gordon. She could call him now. He might be on his lunch break at the auto yard. She wrapped her hand around her phone and then released it again without lifting it from her bag. Should she call him or should she leave him out of it? She was still undecided as to whether it would be too intrusive to involve him without discussing it first with Briar when her phone beeped with a text. She stood back against an office building, sheltering from the wind and the first gentle spittle of raindrops as she checked the screen. Unknown number. ‘How was your evening with your friend? Did the two of you have fun? Jack.’
Throw a Double for Spite Page 9
