It Had to Be You

by Lynda Renham

  It’s tied with a blue ribbon. I look up at him and he smiles.

  ‘I thought blue was appropriate.’

  I bite my lip and pull at the ribbon and open the box. Beneath layers of tissue paper are several pairs of white knickers, two pairs of lacy bras and the most gorgeous white camisole. I stare at them, struggling to find my voice.

  ‘But …’ I begin.

  ‘I took the blue ones to the shop when you were out with Muffy. They’re all the right size and the camisole is silk,’ he says, all hint of his shyness gone now.

  I finger the camisole.

  ‘I feel terrible,’ I say. ‘I didn’t mean for you to buy new ones. I feel so stupid for making such a fuss over the biscuits and then the stupid washing and …’

  He waves a hand dismissively.

  ‘It’s nothing. I’m sorry for being an idiot with the shorts.’

  Part of me can’t help wondering when he found the time to buy them. Does this mean he didn’t spend very long with Andrea, or did he ask her to go with him? I cringe at the thought. That means she now knows my bra and knickers size. As long as he didn’t take Nathan with him, God, I’m not sure what would have been worse.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say looking down. After all, buying a woman underwear is a pretty intimate thing and I barely know the guy. I place the lid on the box.

  ‘Muffy said Oliver is desperate to get you back,’ he says suddenly.

  He studies my reaction. I grimace.

  ‘Well he can stay desperate.’

  He bites his lip. It’s the sexiest thing I have ever seen.

  ‘Muffy said you’ve given up everything, your home and your job to come here. What if you find out the house wasn’t left to you?’

  ‘It was left to me,’ I say sharply.

  He shrugs.

  ‘We don’t have to be enemies you know,’ he says softly. ‘I’m not that ruthless. I’ve not changed the locks yet have I, and neither have you.’

  I meet his eyes.

  ‘I wish I could trust you,’ I say biting into my half of the chocolate penis.

  He does likewise and I feel an ache of longing in my loins. I’m missing Oliver, that’s what it is. I stand up and place my mug in the sink and as I turn I find he is behind me. He leans across to put his mug with mine and our knees touch.

  ‘Goodnight William,’ I say softly. ‘Thank you for the coffee.’

  ‘Thank you for the nipples,’ he says quietly, leaning towards me and kissing me softly on the cheek.

  I feel like telling him he can have my nipples any time.

  ‘Goodnight, sleep well,’ he whispers into my ear.

  I turn my head and his lips brush mine. He pulls away so quickly that I don’t have time to savour it. He mumbles sorry and leaves the kitchen and I’m still standing by the sink when I hear his bedroom door close. Did I imagine that? It was so quick. I take several breaths to stop my heart from racing. We’ve both drunk too much I tell myself and then remember that William had hardly drunk anything. I slowly make my way upstairs. I stop on the landing and stare at his door. God, what am I thinking? I can’t possibly go in there. I close my eyes and remember his lips brushing mine and feel a tiny shudder of pleasure run through me. I go to my bedroom and find two new pillows waiting for me on the bed.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  ‘So, I know someone who knows a private dick. I personally know a lot of public dicks but let’s not go there,’ says Luther taking a breath before blowing up a Foxy Roxy vibrating sex doll.

  ‘Isn’t there a quicker way to do that?’ I say, watching her breasts slowly expand.

  ‘It takes time to find the dirt on scumbags.’

  ‘I meant Roxy. Isn’t there a pump or something you could use?’

  ‘A pump? Honestly sweetie, you’ve become filthy since you started working here, you know that?’ he laughs. ‘You’d never think you’d been here only five days. Anyway, it would spoil my fun. This is the nearest I’ll ever get to blowing a woman and you want to spoil it for me?’

  I change the DVD that has been playing for the past two hours and replace one set of tangled moaning bodies with a different set of tangled moaning bodies.

  ‘Doesn’t matter how often you change them darling, they’re all the same,’ sighs Luther.

  I empty new stock out of a box and stare at a battery-operated vagina.

  ‘God,’ I say miserably.

  ‘I’m sure it’s no substitute for the real thing darling, not that I’d know,’ puffs Luther as he disappears behind Foxy Roxy. ‘So what kind of dirt are you hoping to dig up on this scumbag?’

  ‘I don’t know if I want to dig anything up,’ I say thoughtfully. ‘And I don’t know that he is a scumbag.’

  It has been nearly two weeks since the almost kiss and William has acted like nothing out of the ordinary happened. I sometimes think he is too good to be true and this makes me even more suspicious. Well, you can’t blame me can you?

  ‘I know this guy; he does a lot of undercover stuff. You want me to have a quiet word?’

  I can’t ask Muffy. She thinks William is the best thing since sliced bread, or should I say Hovis, and won’t have a bad word said against him. I’m getting desperate to get this house thing sorted. My parents are dead keen to see the cottage and I haven’t had the heart to tell them that I inherited a gorgeous hunk along with it. Although I am sure my mother would be thrilled. I’ve got quite a few of my things in the cottage now so it feels a bit more homely. Oliver did as I asked and sent them to the post office. The sex shop pays okay but it isn’t exactly climbing the ladder is it? But what else can I do? Wart on the nose Ben Newman has well and truly finished my sales career at least for the time being. The thing is, I don’t know what I’ll do if William Ellis really does own Driftwood. I’ll never be able to rent anything on what I’m paid here.

  ‘Well …’ I begin. I stop when the door opens.

  ‘Yours,’ says Luther. ‘I’ve two more to blow yet, not to mention masking the dummies. You can deal with the wanking pervert. I’ll pop the kettle on.’

  I turn to the customer and grasp the counter when I see the wanking pervert is none other than Oliver. I want to grab a whip from one of the mannequins and give him a good flogging. What an arse, he comes all the way to Hampstead Heath and the first place he goes to is a sex shop. I’m finally seeing my once prospective fiancé for the wanking pervert that he is.

  ‘Well you’re certainly showing your true colours,’ I snap while thinking how handsome he looks in his striped shirt and jeans.

  ‘Dirty mags, or is it DVDs you’re after. Or maybe you’re just looking for a huge-nippled woman. There are plenty of adverts over there and most of them are quite cheap. Or is it dominant female bosses that take your fancy?’

  ‘Muffy wouldn’t tell me where you lived so I came here to say …’

  ‘Or perhaps you’re into something far kinkier now. Our BDSM shelves are over there and …’

  ‘Muffy told me where you worked,’ he says bluntly. ‘I think you’re losing your mind.’

  I see. He screws his boss on Christmas Eve and then wonders why his girlfriend is losing her mind. He stares at my name badge and shakes his head.

  ‘Binki, here to serve your sexual needs,’ he quotes despairingly. ‘Have you gone totally mad, and you’re calling me the pervert?’

  ‘I wasn’t the one caught humping,’ I shout.

  Luther rushes from the back and skids to a halt.

  ‘Difficult punter darling?’ he says glaring at Oliver. ‘We have security,’ he adds nervously. ‘Big burly black men.’

  In fact the only security we have is a rusty panic button and for some reason Luther seems to think mentioning big burly black men is a good deterrent. Personally I think big black burly men are his fantasy.

  ‘Christ,’ groans Oliver. ‘Big burly black men, surely that’s racist isn’t it?’

  ‘No worse than being a sexist punk,’ says Luther with a bravado I know he is far fro
m feeling.

  ‘Luther, this is my boyfriend,’ I say.

  ‘Ah, you’re the wanker who shagged the boss,’ says Luther, giving Oliver the once-over.

  ‘I rather think that isn’t any of your business,’ snaps Oliver, pulling me to one side and knocking over a display of DVDs in the process. ‘Have you gone mad telling everyone our personal business?’

  He looks down at the battery-operated vagina.

  ‘They’re on offer,’ I say stupidly.

  ‘Jesus,’ he mumbles, picking up the DVDs and placing them neatly on the shelves while trying to ignore the pictures on the covers.

  Luther heads towards him.

  ‘Do you want that one mate?’ he says pointing to the one Oliver is holding. ‘I can throw another in. Two for a tenner this week, double your pleasure. You get a free chocolate nipple too. All treats here. We’ve got one called The Spanking Pirate-esses of the Caribbean. Right up your creek so to speak,’ laughs Luther.

  I cringe. Oliver rolls his eyes before saying,

  ‘Disgusting. I seriously don’t believe you shared our intimate secrets with a stranger.’

  He’s a bloody fine one to talk isn’t he?

  ‘No more disgusting than screwing your boss in our bed,’ I say, tears welling up. ‘And Luther is my friend.’

  ‘Your parents are appalled, you know that?’

  ‘You told my parents I worked here?’ I say, stunned.

  God, that’s likely to give my dad a stroke. That’s about right isn’t it, both my parents collapsing after hearing their daughter is working in a sex shop. To them it’s like selling my body. I’ll get the blame of course, not Oliver. If he hadn’t have been at it in the first place I wouldn’t be here. Well, I suppose Ben Newman is to blame really. If he hadn’t have tried to get me over the desk I wouldn’t have left early, and Oliver wouldn’t have been caught, and I wouldn’t be working in a sex shop and consequently my parents wouldn’t be wheeled off to A&E with my dad suffering a stroke all because their daughter is working in a porno store. This whole thing gets worse by the day doesn’t it? How could Oliver even consider telling my parents? He’s the one who’s gone mad.

  ‘They’re on special offer actually,’ quips Luther. ‘All our pirate ones that is, they don’t sell that well.’

  I glare at him. This is a disaster, a complete disaster.

  ‘We’re all worried about you,’ says Oliver. ‘Muffy said you’re becoming obsessed about Aunty Vera’s cottage.’

  Thanks a lot Muffy.

  ‘And that you’re sharing it with some guy called William,’ says Oliver. ‘I’m not happy about that.’

  Huh, like it is anything to do with him. I wasn’t too thrilled about you sharing our bed with Miss Brown Nipples either. I bite my lip to stop myself saying anything.

  ‘There’s nothing you can do until the solicitors get it sorted so why don’t you come home. I’m sorry about everything Binki.’

  ‘So you should be,’ pipes up Luther. ‘I mean come on dude, doing it in your own bed, that’s a bit crass.’

  ‘And what business is it of yours,’ snaps Oliver. ‘Christ, it comes to something when I get given advice from a pissing sex-shop assistant.’

  What a rude bugger.

  ‘I’m a sex-shop assistant, if you don’t mind,’ I say. ‘What are you doing here Oliver?’

  Oliver takes my hand whipping up a multitude of emotions within me. Somewhere in the back of my mind is a little voice whispering give in, give in. It would be so much easier to pack up and go home and continue my comfortable life with Oliver. It wouldn’t take long to find a job. In fact maybe Oliver would now go and punch Ben Newman’s lights out. It would be such a relief to forget about William and whether he is up to something fishy, and not have to watch porno films all day. Not that I watch porn all day, obviously I do a lot more than that, but it would be nice not to have to listen to other people at it, especially as I am never at it myself. Oh the temptation to give in.

  ‘Binki, I want you to know I am very sorry,’ he says raising his voice above the loud moaning of an orgasmic woman.

  ‘Hold on a sec,’ says Luther. ‘I’ll just turn her down a bit.’

  I’ve got a bad feeling about this. Oliver sighs and we wait until the orgasmic woman finishes her moment of ecstasy.

  ‘And, well the thing is …’ Oliver says.

  ‘Go on,’ eggs Luther while I am silently pleading for him not to do so.

  ‘The thing is,’ continues Oliver, ‘I love you and I miss you and, and …’

  Oh God.

  ‘Binki, will you marry me?’ he finishes, producing a single solitaire set in a white gold band.

  Oh my God, he’s done it. He’s only gone and proposed to me in the middle of a sex shop. This seriously could only happen to me.

  ‘Oh babe, I’ve been well and truly screwed,’ says the horny woman in the movie.

  You and me both, I couldn’t agree with her more.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  ‘Five years I’ve worked for the company Binki, what was I supposed to do? There was the promotion staring me in the face. I couldn’t throw the job away.’

  I try to take in what Oliver is saying while staring at the diamond solitaire which sits between the condiments on the café table. The waitress looks at it enviously as she places our order in front of us. Perhaps she would like to marry Oliver. God knows I’m not sure if I want to. I’d made him wait until I finished my shift and agreed to have something to eat with him at the local café. Yes I know, very romantic. But Oliver kind of took all the romance out of it when he proposed during Debbie Does Dallas don’t you think?

  ‘So you slept with her to keep your job?’ I say stiffly, pushing a bacon sandwich away as visions of Brown Nipples assault my brain.

  ‘It was Christmas,’ he says, reaching for the ketchup and dripping it onto the white gold solitaire. ‘I’d drunk too much. She said she wanted to discuss the promotion. The next thing I knew …’

  ‘Oh of course, I keep forgetting it’s okay to get your leg over at Christmas. I must be the odd one because I actually didn’t get my leg over at Christmas at all,’ I snap, grabbing the salt pot and knocking the ring towards Oliver’s plate in the process. I swear one of us will end up eating the thing before this sodding lunch is over.

  Oliver dips a chip into his egg yolk.

  ‘That’s not what I heard,’ he mumbles.

  The waitress seems to spend forever wiping down the table next to ours. She is probably waiting for the wonderful moment when I ecstatically scream Oh yes, I will, and obviously doesn’t think it at all odd that Oliver is proposing over egg and chips in a cheap café just around the corner from a sex shop.

  ‘What does that mean?’ I snap.

  He squeezes tomato ketchup onto his plate, the bottle making a farting noise as it does so.

  ‘Ben Newman,’ he says accusingly with another squirt of ketchup. I snatch the bottle from him, accidentally spilling a drop on his shirt. He looks down and then back up at me wide-eyed. Blimey, I’ve squirted him with ketchup, not stabbed him in the chest with my cutlery. The waitress wanders over with a teapot.

  ‘More tea?’ she asks.

  ‘Oh my God,’ she adds when she sees the ketchup stain.

  Now, she thinks I have stabbed him too. I’m not surprised the way he is clutching his chest.

  ‘It’s ketchup,’ I say with a sigh.

  ‘For Christ’s sake,’ Oliver moans, dabbing at the stain with a serviette. ‘This is a Viktor and Rolf.’

  The waitress rushes over with a wet cloth, smiles, glances at the ring and asks if we need anything else.

  ‘Is everything okay with your food?’ she asks, looking at my uneaten bacon butty.

  ‘Fine,’ I nod.

  ‘I expect you’re too excited to eat,’ she smiles.

  Well something like that. I smile back.

  ‘Ben Newman,’ I hiss as soon as she is out of earshot. ‘Are you serious? Have you seen hi
m?’

  ‘Well maybe men with warts on their noses turn you on. How do I know? You have been behaving oddly the past few months.’

  ‘But bloody Ben Newman,’ I say.

  How could Oliver even think I could shag Ben Newman? In fact, how could Oliver think I would shag anyone while I was with him? But Ben Newman, I mean, bloody Ben Newman. I’ve got to be desperate haven’t I?

  ‘I wouldn’t shag Ben Newman if you paid me a million pounds, and besides Oliver, I’ve always been faithful, which is more than can be said for you.’

  He lifts a steaming mug of tea to his lips and lowers his eyes before saying.

  ‘That’s not what Ben Newman says. Apparently you were at it all the time, that’s what Muffy was told. Rumours are you wouldn’t back off and that he finally had to ask you to leave.’

  What a lying wanker.

  ‘So it seems,’ he continues, ‘that we were both shagging the boss, but at least I did it for a promotion. It will make you happy to know that it totally buggered my back.’

  I don’t believe I am hearing this. Am I supposed to sympathise with his bad back now.

  ‘So it’s okay to be unfaithful as long as it is with your boss and if you get a promotion out of it?’ I say, biting into my bacon sandwich before the waitress asks again if the food is okay.

  ‘Of course not, I never actually said that …’

  ‘And I never shagged Ben Newman. I don’t care what he’s telling everyone.’

  ‘Well …’

  There is silence while Oliver eats his chips and I fiddle with the bacon sandwich to look for bits of bacon that haven’t congealed into fat. He finally gives a weak smile and says,

  ‘Did you have a nice birthday? Did you like the bracelet? I thought …’

  He hesitates as a lad wearing a baseball cap stops at our table.

  ‘Hi,’ he interrupts. ‘You work in the sex shop don’t you?’ He grins, before spitting out his chewing gum and sticking it on our table.

  ‘Actually …’ begins Oliver.

  ‘I ordered two movies, Titty Titty Bang Bang and Forest Hump, are they in yet?’

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ groans Oliver.