What Would Ginger Rogers Do by Caitlin Raynes

Author:Caitlin Raynes [Raynes, Caitlin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781789313468
Publisher: JOFFE BOOKS historical and contemporary romance
Published: 2020-02-18T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

‘Reservation for James, party of three,’ said The Spinnaker maître d’, giving some complicated hand signals to a waiter. No doubt a big fat tip had changed hands. ‘Mr Barry James hasn’t arrived yet. Would you care to wait in the bar?’

‘Sure,’ said Ethan, and he walked away, confident I suppose that I would follow.

That moment of our connection, commiseration, whatever it was in the store, that was over. I knew as much when I picked him at the marina. I wished like hell I hadn’t let myself in for this. What an ass I was to have come to his rescue — if you could even call it that. I should have texted and begged off, but no, here I was, stupidly following him into the bar, walking behind him like a servant, and grinding my teeth audibly. I knew my ‘date’ with Ethan would be all over the island in a matter of hours. Several people, including Frances McTeer, her husband and her neighbors eyed us. All of them except Frances waved. The bar was even more crowded than the restaurant, crammed with lots of well-heeled people in yachting attire, filled with laughter, lively conversation, and the whiff of sunscreen mixed with men’s heady cologne. Ethan and I took two stools at the end of bar. Ethan ordered the proverbial something stronger, a single malt Scotch. I ordered a sidecar, a drink so sophisticated that the bartender looked at me blankly.

‘Campari and soda, then,’ I said.

‘You’d better have a Scotch,’ Ethan wore his usual pressed shirt and slacks, nice shoes, though he had not quite got all the eye make-up off his face and dark rings remained ‘It’s going to be a long night, and it will not be pleasant. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.’

‘Do you not get along with your father?’ I asked.

‘What a stupid question.’ Our drinks came and Ethan took a big swig of his. ‘You ought to know that my parents are divorced. Have been since I was five or six.’

‘Lots of parents are.’

‘Please don’t patronize me, Tosca. I’m not here to write my memoirs. I’m just giving you some background for a little self-preservation. Yours, not mine.’

‘I can take care of myself,’ I said.

He shrugged, bolted the rest of the Scotch, ordered another and sat, sulking till it came.

His un-ironic willingness to spare me some awful experience was unexpected, and I regretted my snotty reflex. ‘I didn’t mean it like that. Please. Go on. Forewarned is forearmed.’

‘You are just full of clichés aren’t you?’

‘All those Shannonville novels. They’ve eaten away at my brain.’

He smiled before returning to his drink. He faced me squarely, and that too, was unlike him. ‘My parents were no good for each other. They should never have married. They fought, and fucked constantly. Their divorce was so toxic, it makes Murph and Jessie’s struggle look like a couple of deacons at a church tea.’

‘Surely your parents aren’t still struggling. You were six a long time ago.’

‘There’s struggle and there’s struggle.

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