Romantic Comedy Box Set (Helen Grey Series Books 1 & 2)

by Hodge, Sibel

  ‘I don’t think they allow snogging in the gym, it’s very distracting. You never know what sort of accident might happen when you’re distracted,’ Kalem said, which jump-started the rational side of my brain to kick in, overriding my emotions bouncing around in all directions.

  I pulled back sharply before he realized what I was thinking and the moment was over and lost, disintegrated into a million other lost moments that we can never get back.

  ‘Snogging! What a ridiculous thought,’ I said, willing my voice to sound convincing.

  ‘We can go back and have an orgasm now after all that hard work, or a bit of aphrodisiac thingy,’ Kalem said, leading the way out of the gym.

  But I seriously doubted he was thinking of the same kind of orgasm that I had in mind.

  Chapter 19

  ‘‘Ere, ‘as this got carrot in it?’ Leila shouted to Atila, stuffing a piece of cake in her mouth.

  Ayshe, Leila, Angie, Felicity and Charlie were all milling around in the kitchen having a pre-dinner drink as we waited for the limo to arrive at seven-thirty.

  Kalem and Atila – who were also going on Atila’s stag do that night – were busy hiding in the lounge from all the women and Charlie.

  ‘I’m allowed carrots; that book said so.’ I finished my piece off.

  ‘No, guess again,’ Atila shouted through the door.

  ‘Ginger?’ Charlie screeched.

  All the girls – except Felicity, of course – were dressed up in party frocks and heels, although I wasn’t going out without my faux fur coat – it was really nippy out there. Charlie, trying to blend in, was wearing a pink-checked kilt with a pair of chunky boots and a glittery white T-shirt which said ‘I’m Free’ on it. I couldn’t see if he was complete with sock, and I didn’t want to pull the kilt up for fear of what I might find lurking underneath.

  ‘No,’ Atila shouted. ‘Kalem, get me a beer will you?’

  ‘Why can’t you get it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t be safe going in there with all those cackling women.’

  I tried to prise open the cork on a bottle of champers, but it didn’t want to co-operate. I didn’t particularly want to break my fingernails; I’d been trying, lovingly, to restore them since chewing them to non-existence after the Justin saga.

  Kalem crept up behind me and tried to yank it out of my hand. ‘No way am I going to let you open that. You never know what sort of disaster will happen.’

  The fiery heat of his fingertips brushing over mine caused an explosion in the nerve endings of my fingers and the bottle slipped from my grasp, sending it crashing to the floor.

  ‘Oh, God!’ I grabbed a dustpan and brush and began to sweep up the pieces of glass.

  ‘Helen, what’s wrong with you?’ Ayshe gave me an odd look, grabbing a handful of kitchen roll and mopping up the sticky champagne slick on the tiles as Kalem opened another bottle of champagne, expertly popping the cork which plopped neatly into the sink.

  A whole kitchen roll and two dish cloths later, Ayshe held out several glasses for him, and I tried to hide behind the door, embarrassed. If I just ignored him maybe I would stop having all these ridiculous feelings about him, which were clearly not reciprocated. But it was pretty hard to do that right now: he looked particularly gorgeous tonight in a white shirt and jeans which fitted him with perfection and accentuated his rather fit body.

  ‘Have you got a licence to take Helen out?’ He grinned at me.

  ‘Ha-ha.’ I sank back against the door frame as he collected a few cans of beer from the fridge.

  ‘You’re dangerous,’ he said, squeezing past me, brushing his chest against mine.

  Good job I had my coat on as my nipples were springing to attention like a couple of missiles.

  I wrapped my coat round me tighter, just in case anyone could see, and found the handcuffs I’d bought for Ayshe in my pocket. ‘Here you go.’ I giggled suggestively at her. ‘You can spice up your love life now.’

  ‘Ooh, great!’ She looked at them. ‘I’m not wearing them out tonight, though.’

  ‘I would.’ Angie raised an eyebrow and studied them.

  ‘Yeah, we know you would,’ Ayshe cackled, putting them on the kitchen work-top.

  ‘If you don’t want them, I’ll have them.’ Charlie picked them up, examining them with delight.

  Felicity couldn’t even bring herself to look at them.

  ‘Where are your mates from work?’ Angie asked Ayshe.

  ‘Oh, they’re going to meet us at the restaurant. And Mum’s not coming, she thinks it will be a bit too outrageous for her; she has to put up with enough outrageousness from Dad’

  ‘Banana?’ Charlie cried.

  ‘Huh? What are you talking about?’ I asked him.

  ‘In the cake. Is it banana?’

  ‘No,’ Atila replied.

  ‘I think it’s got mace in it,’ Felicity piped up and her hairy Rice Krispie twitched.

  ‘When are you going to make me one of those orgasm things?’ Angie shouted out to Atila.

  ‘Ha! I don’t think you need any extra orgasms,’ I snorted.

  Felicity blushed, excused herself and went off to the loo.

  ‘I get an orgasm from the Hoover now,’ Angie said.

  I dreaded to think how. ‘How lovely.’ I pulled a face of mock disgust. ‘Remind me never to borrow your Hoover.’

  ‘I’ve also discovered a new super Rabbit – and you’ll never guess what – a couple of weeks ago my eldest, Libby, found it in my drawer and asked me what it was.’

  ‘You’re joking!’ we said in unison.

  ‘No.’ Angie shook her head. ‘Naturally, I told her the first thing that came to mind, which was that it was a bead-maker. And then the other day she sneaked it to school for show-and-tell without my knowledge and duly told everyone it was her Mummy’s bead-maker! I don’t think I’ll get invited to a parents’ evening ever again!’

  Our cackles of laughter permeated the kitchen.

  Atila cringed. ‘Oh, for God’s sake. Shall we get out of here?’ he said to Kalem, jerking his head towards the door. ‘I can’t stand all these shrieking females.’

  As they clambered round the sofa to get out the door, Kalem caught my eye and threw me a mischievous grin on his way out.

  ‘Potatoes,’ Atila shouted as he closed the door.

  ‘Ooh, err, how queer! I’ve never heard of potatoes in a cake before.’ Charlie was lost for words.

  ‘So Felicity, how’s the Librarianism going?’ I asked when she returned.

  ‘It’s great.’ She shrugged. ‘I love looking at all those books, especially the Bible.’

  ‘I read that book once, thought it was great! When are they going to bring out Bible Two?’ Angie said with a straight face. ‘I bet you’ve been looking at the porno books, really, haven’t you?’ She gave a throaty laugh. ‘The quiet ones are always the worst.’

  I laughed so much that I managed to spray champagne all the way down the front of Felicity’s drab, shapeless, grey, 1970s pinafore dress. ‘Ooh, I’m so sorry.’ I searched for a cloth.

  ‘It’s OK. I’ll go and rinse it.’ She trundled off back to the bathroom.

  ‘Oops,’ I said to everyone, putting my hand over my mouth.

  ‘Why does that say ‘I’m Free’ on it?’ Ayshe pointed to Charlie’s top. ‘I thought you were seeing Marco?’

  ‘This week I am mostly not seeing him. He can be a right little bitch, you know.’

  ‘Where are we eating, have you booked a table somewhere?’ Felicity questioned when she returned with a big wet patch down the front of her dress.

  ‘The China House – you know the one out in the sticks where you can eat as much as you like.’ Ayshe downed her champagne as the limo driver sounded his horn in the car park below.

  ‘Does that include men?’ Angie guffawed.

  ‘Come on you lot.’ Leila rounded us all up and bundled us out the door.

  As we piled into the white Hummer limo, I spied a chilling
bottle of Moet. ‘Ooh, look.’

  ‘Come on, quick, open it!’ Charlie said.

  ‘Only if you absolutely insist,’ I chortled. The champagne was going to my head on an empty stomach.

  We all drank a toast to Ayshe. ‘Cheers.’ I grinned as we chinked glasses.

  ‘Down the hatch,’ Felicity offered.

  ‘Şerefe,’ Ayshe said, Turkish for cheers.

  ‘Chin-chin.’ Angie dribbled some champagne down her spectacular cleavage which was threatening to explode out of her dress all by itself, wiping it off absent-mindedly.

  ‘Bottoms up.’ Charlie crashed his glass against ours with a glint in his eye.

  ‘Charlie, you have to clear this matter up for us. Do you – or do you not – stuff your pants with a sock?’ I drawled.

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to know?’

  ‘YES!’ we all shouted – even Felicity, who was beginning to relax a bit under the influence of the alcohol.

  ‘Well, I’m not sharing.’

  ‘Oh, go on mate,’ Leila shouted.

  ‘No.’ He stuck his nose in the air and refused to tell, leaving us all in everlasting wonderment.

  Amid raucous laughter and joking – and, of course, copious amounts of alcohol – we blitzed out of town with the windows down. As we sped along a deserted country road, the limo slowed down and came to an abrupt standstill.

  ‘Oi, where are we?’ Leila wound the window down and looked out.

  We all fought for a position near the window to have a look-see. ‘’Ere, this ain’t the Chinese,’ Leila said.

  We were parked up outside a café which said: The greasy spoon – Truckers and Bikers welcome.

  ‘Ooh, blimey,’ Charlie muttered. ‘Is this where we’re going?’

  ‘Sorry, folks, there’s a problem with the limo, and I need to check it out.’ The driver got out and wandered around the car, looking at the tyres and kicking them from time to time.

  ‘I went out with a trucker once,’ Charlie said. ‘He was a bit of a brute.’

  ‘Sorry girls, looks like we’ve got a flat tyre. I’ve never changed one on this vehicle before, and I’m not sure where the wheel-brace and jack are. I’m just going to make a call to the office.’ The driver sighed, scratching his head.

  ‘Oh, no,’ we groaned.

  ‘Maybe we should call the restaurant and let the others know we’ll be late,’ I suggested.

  Ayshe fumbled around in her bag for her phone and then frowned. ‘No signal. Anyone else got one?’

  Leila and I looked at ours,which were the same. Charlie hadn’t brought his because he didn’t want Marco to ring him, and Felicity was too much of a technophobe to even possess one. The driver pulled out his mobile and held it up in the air to get a better signal.

  ‘Must be a black spot,’ he mumbled. ‘I’ll try the phone in the café.’

  ‘You don’t think they’ll bite, do you?’ Felicity asked.

  ‘I hope so.’ Angie threw her head back and laughed.

  A few minutes later the driver reappeared. ‘The phone in the café’s broken. Would you believe it?’

  ‘Oh, well. Let’s sit in here for a bit and have some more drinks.’ Ayshe wasn’t bothered.

  We were all starting to feel a bit drunk by then and could really have done with something to eat to soak up all the champers.

  ‘I’m starving,’ I grumbled. ‘I can’t wait for some kung po prawns. They make the best in The China House.’

  ‘I like the seaweed.’ Ayshe nodded.

  ‘It’s not real seaweed, is it?’ Felicity asked.

  ‘No, it’s sewage.’ Charlie sniffed and pinched his nose.

  Felicity looked horrified.

  ‘It’s spring greens or something. Atila had it on the menu once. It was yum,’ Ayshe told us.

  ‘‘Ere, you not ‘ad a Chinese before or summut?’ Leila asked Felicity.

  ‘No, Mummy doesn’t like Chinese.’ Felicity still lived with her mum at the age of thirty.

  ‘Don’t know what you’re missing.’ And then I shivered. ‘Brrr, it’s getting a bit cold in here with no heating on.’

  ‘Listen girls, I’m going to walk up the road and see if I can get the mobile to work, or find a payphone or something.’ The driver said.

  ‘Shall we go into the Café? It’s freezing out here?’ Ayshe asked everyone.

  The consensus of opinion was a yes, so we tottered off in our best party frocks and heels into the dirtiest greasy café known to truckers and bikers. As we wandered in, we glimpsed a handful of Hell’s Angel types at one table, with empty plates stacked in front of them, containing the remnants of coagulated fry-ups. They were all pierced and tattooed to death with big ZZ Top beards and long ponytails. Two of them were in the midst of having a pretty serious arm wrestle, grunting noises filled the air.

  A couple of the other tables were filled with some hill-billy looking truckers, wearing checked shirts and baseball caps, also nursing the standard fry-up and mugs of dishwater-dirty looking tea.

  ‘Ew.’ I wrinkled up my nose.

  At the counter stood a leather-clad, helmet-wearing biker, surveying the scene with interest.

  ‘He looks like an animal.’ Charlie pointed to one of the Hell’s Angels.

  And with that, they all looked up and studied us.

  ‘Hello, girlies,’ one of them said, and then he looked at Charlie, trying to work out if he fell into that category. ‘Lost are we? He smirked, giving us a flash of his filthy-looking teeth, which were very wonky, as well, and looked like dilapidated headstones in a graveyard.

  Some of them looked a lot like the cast out of the film Deliverance. I could hear the banjo music reverberating somewhere in my head, and was a tad worried they were going to ask us to squeal like pigs, although I’m sure Charlie would have quite liked it.

  Felicity hid behind me. ‘Do you think they’ll kill us and steal all our money?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous! This isn’t the middle of Texas, where you can go for miles without seeing anyone, and all the bikers stick together to rob and murder people. Everyone knows where we are,’ I whispered, hoping that was true. But I was a bit doubtful. I was sure I’d heard of some funny kind of ritual these guys got up to, but I tried my best not to recall it from the depths of my memory for fear of shitting myself.

  ‘This ain’t The Ritz, you know.’ One of the Bikers examined us. ‘Wot you doing ‘ere?’

  Leila, recognizing a fellow cockney, did the honours and elected herself group speaker. ‘Broken down, mate.’ She eyed him with suspicion. ‘We’re just off on a ‘en night. What’s it gotta do wiv you lot, anyway?’

  ‘Oh, bugger,’ I muttered.

  ‘Help, Mummy!’ Felicity squeezed her eyes shut.

  ‘Hey, look after these girls, they’re alright,’ the guy at the counter informed the others in an authoritative voice.

  We all looked to our saviour who picked up a triple bacon lard-burger to go and strode towards us, clanking metal rimmed biker boots along the floor.

  ‘Whatever you say, Bulldog,’ one of the bikers said, cowering in the corner.

  I breathed a hefty sigh of relief and mouthed the word ‘thanks’ to him as he gave us a salute and headed out the door.

  And then to our surprise, the Hell’s Angels started roaring with laughter, slapped their hands on the table so hard that it was in danger of collapsing and asked us to join them for a cuppa.

  ‘Better still, there’s some bubbly in the limo. I’ll go and get it,’ Angie suggested, eyeing up one of the bikers who was so hairy he looked like a bear.

  ‘Oi, you!’ One of them with a pierced lip, eyebrow, nose and forehead – and probably a few other things – pointed to Felicity. ‘Come and sit next to me.’

  Felicity screwed her eyes up, shaking her head. ‘Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me.’

  ‘Come on.’ Mr. Piercings moved further up the seat and let her squeeze in next to him, looking down at her moustache and hairy mole in f
ascination. ‘I love hairy women.’

  Felicity let out a nervous snort. ‘Oh, do you?’ she replied in a timid mousey squeak.

  ‘Not ‘arf.’ He gave her a crazy-looking grin.

  ‘Oi Gaffer, get us some mugs, will ya. We’re gonna pour a toast,’ the Bear growled at the chef when Angie came back bearing gifts of red wine.

  ‘We’ve finished the good stuff, we’ll have to start on this.’ Angie held up two bottles of plonk.

  ‘That champagne stuff is bollocks, anyway.’ One of them sniffed.

  ‘So which one of you lot is getting hitched then?’ asked the Bear, looking between us all. ‘I bet it’s you?’ He pointed at Charlie, narrowing his eyes.

  Charlie blushed. ‘It’s not.’

  ‘Is,’ insisted the Bear.

  ‘Not,’ insisted Charlie.

  The chef came out of the kitchen in a grubby apron, containing more grease than the fry-ups on the plates – which was an enormous feat in itself. He carried a tray of pint glasses and laid them in front of the bikers, making himself scarce again as they poured the wine into them.

  ‘Next time, more bacon!’ one of the Hell’s Angels roared at him as he shot back into the kitchen.

  Mr. Piercings put his arm round Felicity, almost crushing her to death.

  ‘Ooh, you’re rather strong.’ She gazed up at him.

  I looked at Ayshe, amazed. It seemed like there was a possible romance blossoming here.

  ‘Can I come on your ‘en night?’ Mr. Piercings smiled down at Felicity. He had a big lump of egg stuck to his beard which wobbled when he spoke.

  ‘Sorry, no. You’re a man,’ Ayshe said.

  Mr. Piercings pointed at Charlie. ‘Well wot’s ‘e doing ‘ere, then?’

  ‘Charlie’s only a pretend man,’ I filled them in.

  ‘Oi, do you mind!’ Charlie retorted.

  ‘So what do you do, then?’ Angie flirted with the Bear.

  ‘Go on, ‘av a guess.’ He looked at her.

  ‘Geoff Capes impersonator?

  ‘Something that involves crushing people to death?’ I asked.