Page 3 of Love and Loathing

Roscoe looked guilty. “Sorry. It was. But then Aubrey called saying he wanted to see me, and I sort of forgot I’d double booked the evening before I said yes. But you’ll like him, I promise.”

“He works forDad.”

Roscoe’s smile was wry. “So did I. And you like me.”

“But you had no choice! He’s there willingly. What does that tell us?”

Roscoe let out a sigh, glancing down the hall to where Aubrey and Poppy were laughing together. “It’s just a job, Eve. There’s a thousand companies like it. Many of them worse.”

“Mm. Like Actuaris.”

She’d been about to go and join the others in the living room when she caught sight of the grimacing look Roscoe flashed her. “What?” she asked warily.

“Just…um…about Actuaris. Maybe don’t go on one of your normal rants about Domnall White being Satan’s evil twin tonight.”

“Why?” she said, ignoring her irritation at the ‘rant’ accusation. They wereimpassioned statements. Not rants.

“Because Aubrey works with him,” said Roscoe. “Domnall White is his biggest client.”

TWO

From the way Roscoehad always spoken of his sister, Aubrey had been expecting some vague, willowy girl with hair down to her knees and orphaned kittens hiding in the gauzy folds of her floral skirt. But Evelyn Blackton was tall, thin, and angular, with slashing cheekbones made sharper by the severe cut of her black bob against her pale skin. As he sat on the sofa in Roscoe’s flat, idly studying her over the rim of his drink, he couldn’t work out if she looked more like a nineteen-twenties flapper or a Russian assassin. The indecision both amused and annoyed him. He’d have to see her dressed in leather.

“No, thank you,” she said to Roscoe now, standing in the living room, one arm tucked across her front. He could imagine a slender silver cigarette holder in the other hand. Perhaps a martini. Except she was currently turning down a glass of wine.

“Oh, shit,” said Roscoe, glass in hand. “Have I done it again?”

She smiled. “Probably. I did try to bring my own, but the off-licence was out of stock. Shall I check the label?”

“It’s fine,” called Poppy, head appearing round the kitchen door, red hair piled messily up. “I got vegan wine.”

“God bless that woman,” murmured Roscoe, handing the glass to his sister. “You’re in safe hands with her.”

Evie laughed, then caught Aubrey’s eye and stopped, something in her expression tipping him back towards the Russian assassin theory. He sipped his drink, trying not to laugh. Perhaps it was poisoned.

“So,” said Aubrey, feeling the need to attempt some small talk as Roscoe went into the kitchen to help Poppy. “Roscoe said you’ve just come back from Spain?”

“Yes.”

There was a short silence reminiscent of a Siberian winter.

“And…how was it?” he persevered, mainly because he guessed she would find that more irritating than if he said nothing.

“Honestly? Heart-breaking. I was volunteering at an animal sanctuary, helping them clear a new field, do all the fencing, build some stables, look after the animals. You know the sort of thing.”

She sipped her wine, tilting her head with an innocent, questioning sort of look that made it clear she knew full well that he did notknow the sort of thing.

“I can imagine,” he said earnestly, his look just as innocent.

“Well. I was there for months. Then I spent a few weeks helping a friend. I was boarding the flight back to England when the sanctuary called me to say they’d lost all their funding.”

“Oh. That must have been…disappointing.”

“Heart-breaking,” she corrected him.

“Mm. Heart-breaking,” he agreed, although, as an expert in the condition, he was quite sure Evelyn Blackton had never come close to the real thing.

“And now…” She paused significantly. “I’ve just learnt that another project I worked on has been shut down.”

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