Page 42 of Crying in the Rain

“He seemed nice,” she said.

“He is. And so’s his wife.”

Pip stopped walking and narrowed her eyes. “You’re such a wind-up…”

His mouth twitched as he fought the smile.

“You’re serious?” she said.

Ade nodded.

“He’s married. To a woman? Ade!”

He burst into laughter. “It’s not like that. Come on.”

They moved off again, and Ade explained properly about Kris and Shaunna being separated, and Casper, and Kris’s stepdaughter, and his shellfish allergy, and so on, chattering away the entire ten-minute walk to the studio. When they parted company at the fourth floor, Pip still didn’t look fully convinced, but he promised he’d keep her posted on any developments and confirm the arrangements for later as soon as he’d spoken to Fergus. He was dreading it, but for the first time ever, he was confident he could see it through. A few hours from now, Fergus would be out of his life, for good.

15: Ginger

Kris

Kris kept checkinghis phone, hoping to see a missed call or a text message—anything to confirm that he was worrying over nothing. He’d tried to convince himself he was being paranoid, but the longer that passed without contact, the greater his anxiety that Ade had done something awful…or something awful had been done to him.

Rationally, there was no reason Ade would have called. He’d only left a few hours ago, and they hadn’t known each other for much longer than that. Whatever was going on was really none of Kris’s business.

But maybe he should have been clearer about wanting it to be his business. To him, this wasn’t just another chance meeting through work, and if that was all it was to Ade, wouldn’t last night have involved a little less sleep and cuddling and a lot more action?

So I’m being pessimistic…and ignoring the bigger picture.Or trying to, at least. It was far easier to pretend Ade was being ordinarily dismissive than the real reasons he wouldn’t think to call—or couldn’t call.

In an attempt at distraction, Kris took the dog for a long walk, but that still left an hour of sitting at home, going out of his mind with worry, and Shaunna was at work, so there was no voice of reason to reassure him that he was overthinking it, focusing only on what could go wrong instead of all that, so far, had gone right. Ade would be at work, that’s all. And if his ex turned up there again, someone would call the police.

He’ll be fine. But what if—

No. Mustn’t think like that.

Kris could stand it no longer. He grabbed his coat and headed for the salon where Shaunna worked.

“Just send him a text,” she suggested without looking away from the straighteners she was pulling through a woman’s hair that was so over-bleached it crackled with the heat.

“The wrong person might see it.”

“Wouldn’t he keep his phone in his pocket or somewhere it can’t be seen?”

“And then he opens the message and they ask who it’s from—”

“Surely, he’d be able to sneak off to the loo to read a message?”

“I don’t even know if he’s at home or at work. He could even be in the hospital or—”

“Kris, stop it!” Shaunna’s raised voice drew the attention of her boss, who had been sitting behind the counter, reading a magazine. Now she came over and took the straighteners from Shaunna and nodded towards the stockroom behind the salon, where they could talk in privacy.

Kris followed Shaunna through into the dimly lit room. It was vast, stacked with plastic bottles and smelled strongly of chemicals but with coconut overtones.

“How about this?” Shaunna suggested. “I’ll call him, number withheld.”

“I don’t want to involve you in this.”

“I already am involved, hun.”

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