Page 3 of Play Our Song

Not only had she lived no more than fifteen minutes away, which was a miracle because honestly, Whitebridge was so small that Sophie had set all the app filters to a hundred-mile radius, but she was nice. And funny. And she wasn’t looking for a threesome with her boyfriend, which was what most nice, funny women seemed to be looking for.

So when Katie had finally suggested a date, Sophie, who’d been far too nervous to suggest one herself, had happily agreed. All of which had led to Sophie and Katie sharing a small, rickety table at the pub on the high street last night.

Things had been going quite well. Sophie had managed not to spill anything down her front, nor to say anything ridiculously stupid. To be fair, the chemistry wasn’t quite as hot as she’dimagined from the messages they’d shared, but still, there was a prickling of something in the air.

Until Katie had started staring off over Sophie’s shoulder when Sophie was talking. Sophie, who’d been talking about her job as the accountant at the family garage and who was well aware that accounting wasn’t particularly scintillating, took the hint.

“And what about you?” she’d asked. “What is it exactly that you do?”

“I’m a horse riding instructor,” Katie had said, turning her attention back to Sophie.

Sophie had had a mental image of Katie with her thighs clamped around something that certainly wasn’t a horse and had swallowed. “That sounds lovely.”

“Mmm,” said Katie, but she’d gone back to staring over Sophie’s shoulder.

Sophie had cleared her throat and tried again. “Do you own your own horse?”

“Mmm,” Katie had said again.

Sophie bit her lip. Something had changed, and she wasn’t entirely sure what it was.

The messages that they’d shared had been polite, then flirty, then downright spicy. And to be completely honest, Sophie had held out certain… hopes. Hopes that maybe after a solid five-year dry-spell she might be seeing some action. Not that she expected anything, or would force anything, but all omens had seemed to be pointing in the right direction.

Enough so that she’d had time to think about where they could get some privacy. Certainly not Sophie’s place, not when she still slept in her childhood bedroom. But Katie had a car and a flat of her own, so maybe…

“I’m sorry,” Katie had said, interrupting Sophie’s thoughts.

“Sorry?” Sophie had said, dragging herself back into the moment.

“Yeah, sorry,” Katie had said. “But do you know that guy?”

Sophie had turned around and anger had flooded every cell of her body. Gio had been sitting there, two tables away, giving Katie a death stare and clearly enjoying his role as impromptu chaperon.

For a second she’d debated lying, but there didn’t seem to be much point. “It’s my brother.”

“Right,” Katie had said, looking slightly relieved but not exactly comfortable.

And when, ten minutes later, Katie had finished up her drink and said that she had to be making tracks, Sophie had known deep down what was happening. But she’d shot her shot, anyway.

“So, how about dinner? Maybe at the weekend?”

Katie had smiled a little sadly and had studiously kept her eyes away from Gio, who was a hulking, brooding shadow in the corner, and had said that it wasn’t Sophie, it was definitely her, and she wasn’t as in the market for something serious as she might have thought. That it had been a lovely drink and a real eye-opener and she’d definitely message Sophie when she was feeling better about dating and…

And then she was gone.

And now Sophie was glaring at Gio over her desk and wondering just when would be an appropriate time to slam the Kia hood down on his neck.

She’d been so angry last night that she’d stomped straight out of the pub and gone home without a word to Gio. Gio, on the other hand, had been whistling over breakfast while Sophie had been hatching a plot to poison his eggs.

“Soph, go and grab us a sandwich.”

She looked over to her father’s legs, sticking out from under a Ford. “Make Gio go.”

Her father slid out and narrowed his eyes at her. “Don’t start with that attitude. We’re a family. Gio’s working on that Kia. You can go and pick up lunch. Get sandwiches from the pub.”

“Make mine ham and cheese,” Gio said without looking at her.

“I thought you were supposed to be clearing out the storage shed out back,” she said, fully aware of the fact that Gio was dreading the job and that her father had been on at him to do it for months now.

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