‘Don’t worry, I know she’s Doug’s deranged sister, I won’t yell at her.’ Ha, much.
‘But—’
‘I shall be charm personified: said Gabe, opening the door.
Except the girl he came face to face with on the landing was no bag lady. This girl was tall and curvaceous in a red wraparound dress and an elegant cream coat. Her hair was baby-blonde and swingy, her eyes were the colour of chestnuts, accentuated by expertly applied eyeliner. Her mouth was curvy and painted red to match her dress. She was even wearing Jo Malone’s Lime, Basil and Mandarin, which was Gabe’s all-time favourite perfume.
This couldn’t be the girl he’d spoken to on the phone last week, surely.
‘Hello!’ She smiled cheerily at Gabe and, key poised, headed for the door of his flat.
It just couldn’t.
Gabe cleared his throat. ‘Are you Sally?’
She stopped, turned. ‘Yes! And you must be a friend of Lola’s.’ Her eyes sparkling, she indicated the mountain of luggage and said jokily, ‘Are you moving in?’
‘I’m Gabe Adams.’ God, it was her.
‘Gabe?’ Sally looked puzzled. ‘But that’s the name of the one who moved to Australia.’
‘I didn’t move to Australia, I went to Australia. But things didn’t work out,’ Gabe said evenly,
‘so now I’m back. Look, I realise this is inconvenient for you, but I’ll help you pack up your stuff. And if you could be out by the end of the week, that’d be great.’
She stared at him. ‘Excuse me?’
How could any girl who lived in such abject squalor look like this? How was it physically possible? ‘Well, you’ll be moving back in with your mother.’ Ha, lucky old her. ‘I’ll even hire a van if you like.’ Gabe felt he was being more than generous; with all the stuff she’d strewn around his flat he’d need a pantechnicon. ‘And we can do it any time this week, whenever suits you best.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Sally. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’
‘But you have to. Because it’s my flat and I need it back.’ Her eyebrows furrowed. ‘And I’m saying you can’t have it back because the agreement was that I could live here for a year at least.’
‘OK, OK.’ Gabe heaved a sigh; it had always been on the cards that she might dig her heels in, decide to be difficult. ‘I’m giving you official notice as of today. That’s in the contract.You have one month to find somewhere else. God knows where I’m going to stay until then, but—’
‘Hang on,’ Sally interrupted. ‘What contract?’
‘The one you signed with the lettings agency.’
‘I haven’t signed any contract,’ said Sally.
Behind him, Gabe heard Lola’s door click open. He turned and said evenly, ‘What’s going on here? Why didn’t she sign the contract?’
Lola could feel her heart clattering away in overdrive. She’d been hiding behind the door listening to their heated exchange. Now it was time to face the music. Uncurling her clenched toes, she took a deep breath and said reluctantly, ‘I cancelled the agency.’
‘Why?’
Oh God, Gabe had been dumped by his girlfriend, he’d just arrived back from Australia, and he was suffering from jet lag on top of jet lag. All in all, he wasn’t in the sunniest of moods.
‘OK, the thing is, I was trying to help.’ When she went on the defensive, Lola knew she used her hands a lot; now they were going like a pair of wind turbines in overdrive. ‘And you told me yourself that the lettings agency charges a fortune, so when Sally came along I thought I could save you a heap of money, which I thought you’d be happy about. Because I knew we could trust Sally, she obviously wasn’t going to be giving you any trouble with the rent, so it made sense to just, you know, deal with her direct and cut out the middleman. She gave me the deposit and the first month’s rent in cash and I paid them into your account.’
‘No problem, I’ll give it straight back,’ Gabe retorted.
‘This isn’t fair.’ Sally’s tone was heated. ‘You’re being completely unreasonable.’
‘Me?’ Gabe jabbed at his own chest and yelled, ‘I’m being completely unreasonable? What about the state of my flat?
Would you say the carnage you’ve reduced it to is reasonable?’ Sally stared at him. ‘How do you know what I’ve done to it?’
‘Because I went in and had a look!’
She gasped. ‘You can’t just let yourself in whenever you like.’
‘You can’t stop me.’ Gabe was really losing it now. ‘It’s my flat!’
‘Which you rented to me. And I like living here.’ Sally’s eyes abruptly brimmed with tears.
‘What’s more, I’m not going to move out.’
‘Oh please.’ Lola was by this stage feeling absolutely terrible. ‘I’m sure we can arrange something. Who are you phoning? Not the police?’
Having pulled out her mobile, Sally was blindly jabbing at buttons. ‘I’m getting Doug over here.
He’ll sort this out.’
Doug? Yeek, the very name was enough to set Lola’s heart racing. Would Gabe and Sally think her shallow if she quickly washed her hair and re-did her face before he turned up?
Chapter
