“Is it really dissatisfaction, or are you simply tired?”
“That’s the sixty-four-million-dollar question, isn’t it? And the trouble is, these days I’m too tired to even begin to figure out the answer.”
“And is work one of the reasons why your last relationship didn’t work out?”
“Not directly.” Carmen pushed her empty glass around. “I don’t think relationships are really my thing. Work is what I’m good at.” She looked thoughtful for a moment. “I’ve only ever had one serious relationship in my life, with a guy called Lewis in my early twenties. God, I loved him to distraction.”
“What happened?”
“Lewis was always deeply invested in the well-being of others. He wasn’t religious, but helping others was almost like a calling for him. We met at uni, in a walking group, and we fell hard and fast. But within a year of him leaving—he was a year ahead of me—we knew we had to make some big decisions. He was applying for jobs with refugee agencies and charities that would take him far from home for months at a time. I knew it was what he really wanted, so I didn’t want to stand in his way.”
“And he left?”
“He did.” Carmen shook her head. “It was awful. We were both heartbroken. But although it took me a while to get over him, I don’t regret what happened. He would write to me, still does occasionally, and the sheer joy that came off the page was wonderful to experience.”
“Ugh, that’s kind of sad but great.”
“It is, isn’t it?” Carmen hesitated, looking across the table at Ash. “What about you? Any great loves in your past?”
Ash wondered how to word her response. “Um, two, I suppose. Although one wasn’t even a relationship. My last serious girlfriend, Leesa, I was with for about two years. We split up soon after I left the bank when I discovered she was only after my money.”
“No! Seriously?”
Ash nodded. “Yes. When I announced I was leaving and likely to set up a tattoo studio in the future, she freaked out. Turns out she’d got quite used to the money I earned, the posh dinners we could have, the luxury weekends away in the countryside.”
“Oh, Ash, that’s awful!”
“Yeah, it hurt; I can’t lie.”
“I’m scared to ask how the other one ended.”
“Other one?”
“You said you’d had two great loves, but that the other one wasn’t even—”
“Oh. Yeah.” Ash huffed out a breath. “That one’s more difficult to talk about.”
“Oh. Well, another time, maybe.”
Now Ash felt guilty for holding back. “Okay, short version. We worked together. She was engaged to a guy, but she and I got…close. Nothing in particular happened, but I fell for her, big-time. Then she married him anyway. It was pretty messy.” And that’s an understatement.
“Oh.”
Ash stood up; she needed to get away from this conversation. “Want another drink?”
“Love one.” Carmen rifled in her handbag and pulled a twenty from her purse. “My turn to pay though.”
Ash grinned. “No problem.”
“Wait, you went on a walk in an area known to have rhinos, and the advice you were given if you saw one was to climb up the nearest tree?” Carmen put down her drink and stared at Ash.
Ash laughed and shook her head. “Look, you make it sound worse than it was. Honestly, it was fine. There were two guards, both armed. The walk was properly certified, and I’m pretty sure the guy was joking with the tree-climbing advice.”
Carmen didn’t know whether to be envious of Ash’s devil-may-care attitude or alarmed by it. Ash was so many things Carmen wasn’t—brave, carefree, relaxed. She could admit to herself that she might have a little bit of a hero-worship crush thing going on right now.
Listening to Ash talk was as intoxicating as watching the way she used her hands to emphasise her words and the way her entire face lit up whenever she shared a particularly happy memory. Carmen had even managed to forget about her phone all evening. Usually the thing was practically glued to her left hand, but there was something about being in Ash’s presence that made it easy to want to forget her work for a couple of hours.
“Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask,” Ash said. “What’s the origin of your name? I mean, Carmen isn’t exactly a classic English name.”
Carmen chuckled. “No, it isn’t. When she was younger, my mother loved going to the theatre and the opera. And her favourite opera is Carmen , so…”
“Really? That’s kind of out there, isn’t it? I mean, it’s not quite how I imagine upper-class people naming their kids. Aren’t they all named after their great-grandmother or great-grandfather or something?”
“Normally, yes.” Carmen laughed. “It was so surprising she went through with it. She’s such a traditionalist about most other things. She followed that up with Tristan for my brother, from Tristan and Isolde , her second-favourite opera.”
“Even fancier.”
“He loves it. Thinks it only adds to his natural sophistication.” Carmen winked.
“Okay, I like the sound of him already.”
Carmen nodded. “He’s a great brother.” She sipped some more water. “So why tattoos?”
“Always been fascinated by them, ever since I was a kid. My dad had been in the merchant navy when he was younger, and his arms were covered in them. He’d tell me all the places he’d been and where he’d had each tattoo done, and I always thought it would be cool to get some of my own. Then, the more I got interested in art at school, the more I thought about possibly joining the two things up.”
“But you didn’t? Well, not right away.”
A frown marred Ash’s features. “Yeah. Parental pressure when you’re sixteen and you’ve left school with only a couple of O levels to your name means finding a job, any job, to bring in some money.” She paused. “I was luckier than some. My mum cleaned houses for some pretty well-off people. One woman was some high-ranking manager at a bank and got chatting to her cleaning lady, my mum, one day,
