Page 19 of Just Like in the Movies

Why was she not surprised the man packed his luggage the way he did everything else? With ruthless efficiency.

He wasn’t wearing any shoes and dark wool socks peeped out from under the hem of his jeans.

Ruby gulped. Why did this whole scene feel stupidly intimate?

‘So, what do you need?’ he said, still packing.

The impatience in the tone snapped Ruby out of her sock-induced coma, a forceful reminder that Luke Devlin was all business, even if she had caught him packing his smalls.

‘In his will, Matty requested I scatter his ashes on the Serpentine; you can see it from here.’ She pointed to the body of water in question, disconcerted when he stopped packing and gave her his full attention. She patted her backpack. ‘I’ve got them with me now. He wanted you to come, too.’

‘Are you serious?’ he said.

Anxiety turned to annoyance in the pit of her stomach. Did he think she’d made it up? Why would she do that? Unless … Her mind stalled. Did he think

she was coming on to him? The arrogant … She took a steadying breath.

Don’t lose it. Stay focused. And as unemotional as he is.

‘You possibly missed that part of the will reading when you walked out to go to your very important meeting in Canary Wharf,’ she said, not quite able to keep the hint of bitterness out of her tone.

His gaze flattened and she knew he hadn’t missed the implication. That he’d been more interested in his business meeting than the final wishes of a dead man. But he didn’t seem remotely phased – or guilty. Just more proof, if she needed it, that Jacie was right – he had had a heart by-pass.

‘Are you sure that’s legal?’ he said at last.

‘What?’ she asked, confused.

‘Scattering human remains on public land?’ he said. ‘At the very least my guess would be you’d need a permit.’

Ruby stared at his formidable frown for two very long seconds, completely nonplussed. ‘You’re not serious?’

‘Of course I’m serious, have you researched it?’ he replied, as if she were a person with severe learning difficulties.

‘No, I haven’t researched it,’ she said slowly, so he would understand the significance of what she was doing here.

‘Then there you are,’ he said, and turned to zip up his hold-all.

‘I don’t need to research it,’ she continued, the buzzing in her ears turning into a maelstrom. ‘It was Matty’s dying wish. I couldn’t give a toss if you need a permit or not. Or whether or not it’s legal. I’m doing it tonight because that’s what Matty wanted. I stopped by to invite you along because for some unknown reason you mattered to Matty and he obviously wanted you to be part of his final farewell.’ Although that impulse was looking increasingly bonkers. The man appeared to have about as much empathy as the Wicked Witch of the West or one of her flying monkeys. Something Matty must have been wholly unaware of, or he would never have left his nephew half The Royale, or put her in this impossible situation.

Devlin straightened, and stared her down past that prominent nose. And for the first time since she’d met him, she detected a real emotional reaction from him. Unfortunately, the reaction wasn’t guilt, it was irritation.

‘Uh-huh,’ he said. ‘Because I so want to get arrested on my last night in London? Was that your thinking?’

‘We won’t get arrested. That’s ridiculous. At the most we’d probably get a caution.’

‘Yeah, well, thanks but no thanks. You go scatter my uncle’s ashes all you want, but you can leave me out of it.’

Ruby clutched the backpack, wishing, for a moment, she could get out Matty’s plastic urn and dump the contents on Devlin’s perfectly styled hair. What a prick. Unfortunately, that would be a disservice to her best friend, who did not deserve to get scattered over a dipshit like Luke Devlin.

‘Fine, I will,’ she said. ‘I’m fairly sure Matty wouldn’t have wanted you along anyway if he’d ever actually met you.’

She marched to the door, ready to make a dignified exit. But then something twisted inside her. The same something which had got her in trouble age fifteen, when she’d told one of her mother’s boyfriends to get his hand off her bum, and again at age sixteen when she’d waltzed out of her maths GCSE exam after signing her name ‘Miss Couldn’t Care Less About the Sum of the Hypotenuse’ on the top of the paper. The same something that had come to her rescue two weeks ago when Matty had collapsed in front of her holding his left side and she’d had to pull herself together and call an ambulance before she went totally to bits. It was what her mum had once called her Arsey Gene. The gene that told her now, she needed to get the last word in here, if for no other reason than Matty’s wishes meant something. And this sod didn’t get to piss all over them with his snotty attitude.

She paused at the door. ‘But before I leave, I’ve got something to say to you.’

He sighed. ‘Don’t tell me, this is the big parting speech? How about you get it over with fast because I’ve got a plane to catch in three hours.’

She hesitated, momentarily taken aback by the biting sarcasm in his tone. Good grief, how did anyone get to be so jaded? Or so much of an insensitive dickhead? She swallowed, bolstering her courage and calling on her Arsey Gene, which seemed to have momentary malfunctioned on being introduced to his Couldn’t-Give-a-Shit Gene.

---