Forget Me Not (The Ceruleans: Book 2) Page 12

  ‘Don’t you worry about that,’ she declared with glee. ‘I came prepared. Plenty of Custom Cara designs to choose from. Oh, and last time I was at yours I swiped those red strappy sandals. Knew you’d never bring them.’

  ‘Oh no. The Vogue heels?’

  ‘The slutty heels!’ she shouted.

  An old bloke sitting on a deckchair nearby turned and frowned at us. It was the same guy who’d given us evils for singing ‘The Final Countdown’ yesterday, I realised. I gave him an apologetic smile and turned to my mouthy friend.

  ‘You know I can’t walk in them, Cara.’

  She checked her watch. ‘So get Luke to carry you then.’

  ‘Ha ha. Where is it we’re going anyway?’

  ‘Bar crawl and then some new club called Infinity.’

  ‘Crawl is likely in my case if you make me wear those shoes.’

  ‘Wear them for Luke,’ she said. ‘Guys love heels.’ She checked her watch again.

  ‘Are you late for something?’

  ‘Not at all!’

  I peered at her. ‘What’s up with you? You’re all… wriggly.’

  ‘Worms,’ she declared cheerily, and then launched into a lengthy list of outfit options for the night.

  I sat back and stared out to sea. Funny – last time I’d looked there had been loads of surfers out there, but now only a few remained; the rest had waded back in and were spread around the middle of the beach, amid napping grandpas and picnicking families and snogging youths. Somewhere near the shoreline I saw Si and Tamara fiddling with their boards. Geoff and Lucy were stretched out by a gang of lads playing football. Mouse and Kyle were sitting together on the sand looking out to sea. I scouted around some more. That bloke lying on his back sunbathing had ginger hair: Andy? And there, meandering along the shore with his board, was Duvali. I looked for Luke. There – he was weaving his way over, board under his arm.

  He dumped the board beside me and sat down on it, bending over to give me a peck on the cheek. Without waiting for a response he leaned forward to look at Cara. ‘All right, sis?’

  ‘All right,’ was her reply.

  I was just opening my mouth to ask why everyone was beach-bound already when an almighty beat pounding out right beside me made me jump. Queen, ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’. I cringed and turned to tell Cara she’d better turn the volume down, but she was no longer beside me. She was up, on the sand beside the rug. And she was dancing. Swaying, head tossed back, hands ribboning fluidly through the air – until the chorus came in, and then she was crazy-dancing.

  I watched her with a smile, my mad, fearless friend. Old glary man was going to love this. I flicked my eyes his way now, to get his reaction. He was reading his newspaper. But a mum to the side of him was watching, wide-eyed, and a little kid had frozen mid-sandcastle. In fact, a good number of people were gawping at us now, thanks to the deafening music. We were going to have some angry people coming our way any minute.

  Movement amid the gawpers caught my eye. Mouse and Kyle. Facing us. Dancing. Dancing!

  And then Si and Tamara.

  And then a whole bunch of strangers in wetsuits – short, tall, thin, fat, teenaged, middle-aged – executing a fast-paced dance routine in pretty decent synchronisation.

  Flash mob!

  I turned to grab Luke – he had to see this!

  He wasn’t beside me any more. He was up on his board, dancing.

  I clapped a hand to my mouth but a laugh of delight escaped anyway. Luke!

  Beyond Luke, the beach was a frenzy of activity – gobsmacked people sitting and standing surrounded by grinning surfers dancing it out. I spotted Geoff and Lucy giving it large, and Andy, and Duvali. And there, out on the sea, straddling his surfboard, Big Ben, floater from the waist down, dancer from the waist up.

  But it was the final wave of people to join in that most tickled me. For among them was old glary man. He stood slowly, shakily, and eased off his checked shirt to reveal a neoprene vest beneath, and then he was off – arms twisting, turning, seriously working his way through the routine.

  I watched them all avidly, from the epicentre of it all, alternating between laughing and grinning wide enough to split my lips, legs jiggling to the beat, half-wishing I could be up there with them.

  And then Freddie Mercury was on the final refrain, and then the music faded and then, just like that, it was over. Casual as you like, everyone switched right back into normality, returning to sunbathing and chatting and reading the paper, as if the last three and a half minutes had never occurred. And yet the joy of it all hung palpably in the air.

  Luke collapsed beside me. ‘Told you I’d keep you on your toes,’ he said.

  I grinned at him. ‘That was awesome. Surreal. Weird. Awesome. Who organised that?’

  ‘Who d’you think?’ said Cara beside me.

  I turned to look at her. She was radiant.

  ‘You did this?’

  ‘Yep. With a little help from knows-everyone Si, naturally. And his choreographer mate, Tamara.’

  ‘Oh. Aren’t they –’

  ‘No, silly. She’s the one who trained us up.’

  ‘Well, she did a great job. It was awesome. You were awesome. Getting up before everyone else...’

  ‘Awesome?’

  ‘Awesome!’

  ‘You were awesome, Cara,’ said Luke. ‘I thought you were only doing the routine from the waist up? I swear there was some foot action creeping in there.’

  ‘You noticed? My legs are a little… looser today.’ She looked at me. ‘You don’t mind that we didn’t include you? We started planning this months ago, before you came to the cove, and well, Luke…’

  ‘I wanted to surprise you,’ he told me.

  ‘You certainly did that.’

  ‘Good surprise?’

  ‘Good surprise.’

  ‘Good like your boyfriend’s a loveable goof who can’t dance, or good like your boyfriend’s got all the moves and was so damn sexy doing the step-tap-step-tap that you could barely contain your urge to pounce on him and kiss him?’

  In answer, I pounced, knocking him back onto the sand, and kissed my loveable goof with laughing lips.

  25: CLUB INFINITY

  The afternoon hanging about the apartment was heaven. The sunbathing on the balcony was heaven. The siesta with Luke was heaven. The dolling-up session with Cara was heaven. The takeaway pizza was heaven. The walk into town was heaven. The cosmopolitan in Bar de Nada was heaven. The woo-woo in Rhu-Bar was heaven. The sex on the beach in Baa-Bar was heaven.

  The Infinity club was hell.

  Well, at least that was my first thought when the bouncer ushered us through and I stepped into a cavernous, dark, sweaty room full to bursting with scantily clad girls and horny blokes. The lights were flashing fit to bring on an instant migraine and the music was loud enough that it was pulsing through me in a way that felt unpleasantly like heart palpitations.

  ‘All right?’ shouted Luke in my ear.

  ‘It’s quite loud,’ I commented.

  ‘What?’

  ‘IT’S QUITE LOUD.’

  He pointed to his ear and shook his head.

  I gave him a thumbs-up instead.

  The evening was warm enough that we’d walked down without jackets, so we gave the cloakroom a miss and Si led the way to the bar. This time, I ordered a pint of lemonade – I had a feeling I was going to need to rehydrate given the temperature in the room. Once we’d all been served, Si gestured for us to follow him, and he bopped in time with the beat along the walkway edging the dance floor. As I followed Cara, I looked out at the mass of writhing, jiggling, jumping, flailing bodies immersed in the drum-and-bass track. It was a far cry from this afternoon’s flash mob – classic eighties music and a choreographed routine. I knew which I preferred.

  An impressively inebriated man crashed into me, knocking me back into Luke.

  ‘Hey!’ my boyfriend shouted over my head. ‘Watch it!’

  The man gave a w
obbly salute and squirled off into the throng.

  I dodged a gropy guy and two girls having a handbag fight before reaching our destination: a small, curtained-off snug attached to the main room. It had mirrored walls and purple velvet banquette seating and not a single reveller but for those in our group.

  ‘Hallelujah,’ I breathed, stepping in.

  I sank onto a seat beside Cara, and Luke slid in beside me. It was a little quieter in here, even with the curtains swept wide open – quiet enough to have a conversation without screaming, at least. Still, Cara didn’t bother to temper her volume in the slightest.

  ‘It’s a circus out there!’ she hollered. ‘Did you see that group of stags with inflatable sex dolls? And that woman with her bra on over her dress? And that beanpole bloke in the spotty suit and the massive wig? And the girls wearing fairy lights – in September!’

  ‘Cara,’ said Luke. ‘Breathe, will you?’

  She did, for all of a second, and then announced, ‘I love it!’

  Luke rolled his eyes. ‘First timer.’

  ‘You club a lot then, Luke?’ I said, before Cara could come back at him.

  ‘Er…’

  Cara took a big gulp of her drink, and then yelled, ‘C’mon! Who’s dancing?’

  Kyle, to her other side, shook his head. Cara pouted, and Si stepped in smoothly.

  ‘Come on, CC. I’m always up for it.’

  He held out a hand and Cara took it and stood up. I watched as they weaved their way out to the dance floor. They made a striking couple – both outgoing, both charismatic, both decked out in zany designer clothes, even if Si’s were from Bond Street and Cara’s were from Oxfam. As I watched Si leaned down and said something in Cara’s ear, and she threw her head back and laughed.

  ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Him.’ And then cursed myself for thinking aloud when Luke said at once:

  ‘Him who?’

  Well, perhaps it was better coming from me…

  ‘Si,’ I said. He looked confused, so I added, ‘And Cara.’

  ‘What about them?’

  I gently took his head in my hands and turned it towards the dance floor, where his sister and his mate were moving energetically to the beat.

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Luke. ‘Yeah, those are some bizarre moves.’

  ‘And yet they pull them off. Together.’

  ‘Er… do they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Luke watched them for a short while, until funky move became flirty move. I saw his eyebrows sink. He bellowed over my head:

  ‘Hey, Kyle!’

  ‘What’s up?’ said Kyle, breaking off his conversation with Andy.

  ‘Shouldn’t you be dancing with my sister?’ said Luke, jabbing towards the dance floor with his thumb.

  Kyle looked over at Cara and Si, grinned and said to Luke, ‘No, man.’

  With that he turned back to Andy, leaving Luke to gape at the back of his head.

  ‘Hey,’ I said, reaching over and touching the spot between his eyebrows. ‘If you frown any more, you’ll have a unibrow. Like Bert on Sesame Street.’

  ‘Cara and Si!’ he said. ‘How long?’

  I shook my head. ‘They’re not. Yet. But it looks like he likes her too, so hopefully, in time….’

  ‘But she’s my little sister!’

  ‘Pretty much my age, Luke.’

  ‘But Si’s so…’

  ‘... great. Which is why you’ve been friends for so long.’

  ‘Hmph,’ he said.

  I squeezed his hand. ‘Cara’s always been totally supportive of her friend seeing her brother, hasn’t she? So of course you’d be supportive of your friend seeing your sister.’

  He thought about that, and then exhaled slowly. ‘Scarlett Blake,’ he said. ‘You have an infuriating habit of talking sense. Except the Sesame Street thing. I don’t look like Bert.’

  ‘Well, your hair is dark and kind of prone to sticking out…’

  He cut me off with a kiss, and I felt his laugh through it, the vibrations tickling my lips.

  ‘Speaking of looks,’ he said, ‘did I mention that you’re stunning tonight? I especially look forward to removing those shoes later.’

  I glanced down at my outfit – a Cara pick. Tight cropped black trousers, a crimson chiffon shirt and the red strappy sandals I’d worn to my first Si party. I rather envied Luke for being able to come out in jeans (albeit smart ones) and a simple black shirt. Pretty much the only part of my outfit I was comfortable with was the necklace – Luke’s pendant, which I wore always.

  ‘So, is the lady in red dancing with me tonight?’

  I plastered a smile on my face. ‘Sure, let’s –’

  ‘Don’t bother,’ he said. ‘I can see this isn’t your thing.’

  ‘I’m sorry –’

  He kissed the end of my nose. ‘Don’t be daft. You don’t have to be anything you’re not with me. Besides, I’m all danced out for today. How about we just stay here?’

  So we did. For the next hour, as our friends came and went around us, we snuggled and talked and kissed and people-watched. And I began to think that Club Infinity wasn’t quite so hellish.

  Eventually, when my drink glass had stood empty on the table for a good while and the heat was starting to get to me again, Luke headed off to do a bar run, leaving me alone in the snug. I relaxed back into the seat and scanned the crowd for glimpses of the others. I spotted Cara, dancing with Si and Mouse in the middle of the floor. Geoff and Lucy were jumping up and down by the speakers, and Duvali was attempting some dodgy Patrick Swayze moves with a laughing Tamara. Liam and Andy and Kyle were elusive, though, and I stood up to scan further. I checked the dance floor, the bar – there they were, lined up doing slammers. But I couldn’t pick out Luke towering above the other drinkers there. I let my eyes stray across from the bar, over to the toilets, but along the way my gaze froze. Over by the DJ box, underneath a glowing Fire Exit sign, I saw someone I knew.

  Not my boyfriend, though.

  My sister.

  26: THAT’S THE SPIRIT

  Tall, svelte, beautiful. Cropped hair spiking out in every direction. Lips the colour of blood. Dress the colour of death.

  Sienna.

  I reached out and braced myself on the mirrored wall. My sister, here. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. My sister, here!

  She was leaning against the wall, lips curled in distaste, watching a drunk bloke grind up against a girl on the dance floor.

  ‘Sienna,’ I whispered. Then, louder, ‘SIENNA!’

  I don’t know what made her turn her head. She can’t have heard me over the din of the music. But in a moment green eyes locked on green.

  She jerked. Stood up tall, pushing away from the wall. Her lips parted and she took a step forward, toward me.

  ‘Scarlett. Helloooooo. How goes it?’

  A looming hulk blocked my view. Big Ben. Standing right in front of me, clinging to a bottle of cider and grinning idiotically.

  ‘MOVE!’ I shouted at him, pushing him to the side.

  He staggered. ‘Hey!’

  I ignored him, searched out the exit sign, looked down.

  She was gone.

  Even as I shoved past Ben and began elbowing my way across the dance floor – the shortest route from here to there – I knew this was madness. She wasn’t here. She was the tiger in the deserted street. She was Shrek walking down Plymouth High Street. She was my grandfather hoeing in the garden. She wasn’t real. But still my legs powered me on, and my arms pushed frantically against hot, sweaty people.

  I reached the fire exit. No sign of her.

  Well, that’s that, a voice in my head said calmly. And yet my hand found the metal bar across the door and pushed it, and my feet moved forwards, propelling me out into the cool air of the early hours.

  I was in an alley running along the back of the club and the neighbouring building. It was narrow and gloomy and reeking of the rubbish decaying in two industrial-size bins. It was also deserted. />
  My hand was still on the door, holding it open. Go back inside, I told myself. She’s not here. She never was.

  I let go of the door. It slammed shut behind me, cutting off the light from the club, leaving me in gloom. At one end of the alley, the yellow glow of a streetlight beckoned. At the other end, where alley intersected alley, there was the slightest suggestion of a different coloured light.

  I walked quietly along the back of the club, away from the street. With each step the pumping beat of the club’s music receded and new sounds became audible – scuffling, a muffled thump. Then a voice, too low for me to make out the words.

  At the corner I stopped and slowly leaned out. And had to bite down, hard, on my lower lip to keep in the shout that surged up.

  The alley beyond was narrower still and wreathed in shadows, but moonlight slanting down across the roof cast the terrible scene in light. Two young men – one hulking and powerful in head-to-toe black; the other shorter and squat and denimed out but for his glaringly white trainers. But it wasn’t their looks that had stopped me short. It was their positions in the tableau. The tall guy had his back to me and his face very close to his captive. Yes, captive: he had the short one up against the wall, pinned with a forearm pressed into his throat, and was firing expletives as a cobra spits venom.

  ‘You make me sick,’ he hissed.

  The short man tried to protest, but the force on his windpipe was increased so that all that came out was a terrified squeak.

  ‘When I’m done with you, you’ll be begging for hell. I am going to rip your –’

  I didn’t think: I just launched myself out into the light, shouting, ‘No!’

  Both men froze.

  ‘I’m calling the police!’ I warned in a voice that was maddeningly unsteady and scrabbled in my pocket.

  In the second or so it took me to dig out my phone the attacker had dropped his arm. The short guy wasted no time in stumbling away, and then he took off running. As he passed me, I got a good look at his face. I recognised him, even with the blood flowing out of his nose: he was the drunk grinding bloke from the club, the one Sienna had been watching. Well, my imaginary Sienna. But there was no time to think about that now. The thug in black had turned around and was moving towards me.