“How about it, Lark? Another?”
“No thanks. I have a scary feeling one’s my limit.”
“But you’ve had two.”
“That’s what makes it scary.” She wasn’t going to dampen this night by drinking too much.
Kenny was four or five drinks ahead of everyone else, having polished off a pair at the bar and several more at the table. He took Channing’s hand as he addressed her. “My darling, I noticed a jewelry shop on the lower deck, duty free. All sorts of fabulous diamonds and rubies. Probably a fair bit of polished glass too. What do you say we go pick out a ring?”
“A ring?”
“An engagement ring. Anything you want, my lovely countess.”
“Oh, stop your silly nonsense. I’m not marrying you.”
“Why not?” His wailing drew the attention of the three women at the next table, who’d paused their conversation to eavesdrop.
“Because you’re pissed.”
“I didn’t mean right now. We’d have to do a proper announcement at Breckham with all the posh people. In our finest clothes, of course. I can wear my top hat! I love my top hat. And I look amazing in it, don’t I, Ollie?”
“It really is a smashing hat.”
“You can invite all of your friends,” Kenny went on, gesturing toward Lark as he swayed in his seat. “All of your friend, I should have said.”
Channing shot her a wink. “Pay him no mind. He’s taking the piss out of you.”
“Nooo! I was taking the piss out of you, Channing. Because you don’t have friends, you have friend. Singular. She is your friend, isn’t she? Just your friend, as I recall you saying.”
As usual, Lark got the feeling she was the only one not in on the joke. What made this time unnerving was that Kenny didn’t seem to be joking.
“Of course she’s my friend. She’s your friend, she’s Oliver’s friend.”
“You said she was very nice. I think she’s nice too.” He looked over his shoulder at Oliver. “I’m right, am I not? Dr. Lark is very, very nice.”
“Very nice.” Oliver zipped his hoodie and draped Kenny’s sweater across his back. “It’s time we called it a night, my lord. Bid the countesses adieu.”
Kenny ignored him, turning his attention back to Lark. “I told Channing you were a fit bird.”
“A fit bird?”
“That means the viscount thinks you’re hot,” Channing said.
“You know what she said? That you weren’t her type. Which is good for you, since her type apparently is an old, bitchy slag.”
Channing stiffened. In a growling voice Lark hadn’t heard her use before, she sternly said, “You’re drunk, Lord Teasely. I strongly suggest Oliver walk you back to your cabin and put you to bed.”
Not her type. It stung to know she’d said such a thing. Obviously she and Kenny had discussed her at some point, and Channing had thought it necessary to emphasize the fact that they were just friends. That explained the friend talk and all the very nice platitudes.
Kenny jerked his arm away, his odious sneer forewarning a nasty turn. “And you should also be aware that Channing only likes women who are smart.”
Lark’s stomach heaved, as though the ferry had dropped from the top of a giant swell. “Sounds like you guys did a full assessment.”
“In fact we did. I told her I thought you were smart…that you’d have to be because you’re a doctor. But she said you aren’t really, so maybe not that smart. Dr. Lark…what’s your last name again? Should I call you a doctor? Ha, that’s funny. ‘Call me a doctor… Okay, you’re a doctor.’”
“You’re such a bastard,” Channing muttered viciously.
That she’d answered with an epithet instead of a denial might as well have been an admission as far as Lark was concerned, especially since her cheeks were glowing red. There was no reassuring look, no clarification that Kenny had taken her words out of context.
So she wasn’t really interested…fine. That alone was awkward enough, as it meant she’d been playing her all evening, probably hoping to get laid. But why all the badmouthing her to Kenny? No wonder she’d felt out of the loop so often with their jokes—because she was the joke.
Lark felt a surge of indignation. She had better things to do than serve as a mascot to snooty people whose idea of fun was talking about people behind their backs. If this was the way they behaved together, she wanted no part of any of them.
Oliver implored, “Come, Lord Teasely. You promised me a cigarette.”
“No! I want another Blow Job.” Kenny said it again, louder the second time, eliciting another giggle from the next table. Now sloppy with both his posture and speech, he addressed Lark again while waving a dismissive hand at Channing. “Don’t listen to her. I think you’re very smart.”
No way was she going to spend tomorrow with these three in Amsterdam knowing what they were really like. When they reached Holland in the morning, she’d book an immediate return trip and arrange for her own ride back to Cambridge.
“It’s been a long day,” she said, leafing through her wallet for a few quid to cover her part of the bar bill.
“Please don’t go.” Channing grasped her forearm and spoke to Oliver through gritted teeth. “Oliver’s taking Kenny to bed right now.”
“Blow Job, Blow Job.”
Oliver pulled him to his feet. “That’s enough, Kenneth. You’re being a right knob head.”
There was no graceful path out of the conversation for Lark. At best she’d get a thorny apology, something with a ’splain suffix. Drunk-’splain, joke-’splain. Their fabricated excuses would only make it worse. “I’ll catch you all later.”
* * *
Channing had forgotten what a dick Kenny could be when he drank too much. He’d pulled a similar stunt several years ago at a Christmas party, repeating an unflattering comment she’d once made about an associate of Poppa’s…that she’d rather run the till at Starbucks than take a job at his bent investment bank. Kenny’s slip of the tongue had caused hard feelings between Poppa and his friend.
The lounge on Deck 9 held several rows of reclining chairs for passengers who hadn’t booked a cabin. Lark was probably in one of them, hidden by the dim light. After a third pass of the ship’s common areas, Channing gave up her search and retreated to the stateroom.
The interior berth was anything but stately, barely wide enough for the two single bunks that swung down from the wall on either side. A cabin steward had turned down the fresh white sheets and placed a chocolate on each pillow.
Plz come to the room, she texted, adding four different emojis saying she was sorry. Dots appeared briefly on her screen to indicate that Lark had seen it and was typing a reply, but the message never followed.
Lark had her own key. Maybe her plan was to wait until much later when she thought Channing would be asleep. As if…
“Bollocks!” She banged her hand on the door to the bath and shook it until the pain subsided. As much as she’d like to blame Kenny for this whole cock-up, he wasn’t the real culprit. Those cutting remarks about Lark had come from her mouth, an elaborate dodge to avoid admitting an attraction. All because she hadn’t wanted Kenny to minimize her relationship with Payton. Hadn’t wanted to appear fickle. Hadn’t wanted to hear his endless, self-serving advice.
She was seconds away from returning to Deck 9 to try again when the door handle turned and Lark entered. A quick search of her face yielded nothing encouraging, only a strained pursing of the lips and a deliberate effort to avoid eye contact. At least she was here.
“Lark, I’m so very sorry. What Kenny said…that’s not at all what it meant.”
“It’s fine, obviously a misunderstanding. We’re all cool.” Cool indeed—her tone was icy with feigned civility. “I didn’t realize these inside cabins were so small. Maybe I should go back up to the lounge.”
“No, please stay. I’d feel simply awful if you left.” She’d feel awful no matter what, since her flippant remarks had cause
d this mess. “You must think I’m horrid. For what it’s worth, I feel horrid. I’m absolutely gutted to think I’ve hurt your feelings or disrespected you in any way. If you’ll please let me, I can explain.”
“No explanation necessary. It’s late, we’re tired. I’m just going to grab a quick shower and call it a night.”
Except Channing wouldn’t sleep a wink. It was painfully obvious their morning would be dreadful if they didn’t put this awful mess to bed.
“It’s not fine, Lark. It’s upsetting. We’d been having such a lovely time and it all went to shite. If I could just…” She closed her eyes and sighed, achingly aware that her words made her sound as though she was focused more on fixing her guilt than making Lark feel better. “Never mind, I’m sorry. Needless to say, you have every right to tell me to sod off. A decent person would respect that.”
Lark rummaged through her overnight bag, setting out her toiletries and a pair of navy blue pajamas exactly like the ones Channing had brought, the cushy knits British Airways had distributed to first class passengers on the flight from Boston. Entering the bathroom, she replied over her shoulder, “I never said you weren’t decent. It was awkward is all, knowing you guys had been talking about me. Surprised me a little…I didn’t expect it.”
“Bollocks,” Channing said again, this time under her breath as the door closed. A mere apology would fall dreadfully short, no matter how sincere. Had there been a florist aboard, she’d have tried her luck with a peace offering. Surely there was a fresh floral basket that said, “Forgive me, I’m a reprehensible arse.”
The next twenty-two and a half minutes passed like a dinner with her mum as she waited miserably on her bunk. It was a relief at least that Lark was in for the night. If she’d intended to leave the cabin after her shower, she’d hardly do so in pajamas.
When she finally emerged from the bath, Channing wanted to smile at the sight but didn’t dare. The sleeves of the oversized knits extended past her fingertips, while the legs pooled at her ankles. Lark’s curly hair stood every which way from its towel drying, and her face was red from a good scrubbing.
“I know my credibility is in the toilet right now, but you look absolutely darling.”
Lark checked herself in the mirror that was mounted on the back of the door. “These don’t exactly fit, do they?”
“On the contrary, they’re perfect.” Channing gestured for Lark to sit on the other bunk. “Will you please allow me to properly apologize? Surely you’d like some explanation of that miserable debacle.”
“To be honest, I’m worried that I won’t. Like it, that is. My experience is that people try to explain why they did something shitty and they sometimes end up making it even worse.”
“Fair enough, but I’m going to take that as a personal challenge to leave things better than they were.” So Lark had decided she was shitty. Nothing like starting off deep in the hole. “I suppose I should get this bit out of the way first. It grieves me to say that despite being pissed out of his mind, Kenny actually managed a rather accurate recitation of our conversation, which it so happens took place several days before our dinner at Penderworth. He’d met you only once, briefly, at the Crown and Punchbowl. For that matter, I knew you only slightly better. I wish I could at least challenge his version of events, but I’m afraid I can’t. To put it bluntly, I said what he said I said, every word.”
“See, this is exactly why I was worried I wouldn’t like it.”
“Right, well…he recalled the words but he totally left out the context, which is why it sounded so horrid coming from him. He’s always had a certain silliness about him, which I’d meant to avoid. I’m sure you’ve noticed that side of him, what with his screaming for Blow Jobs and all. When I told him you were coming for dinner, he practically had us both at the altar in a fortnight. He’s not the sort of person who needs encouragement to run off on his own tangents. To quell that, I stupidly said you weren’t my type…that I found you rather ordinary looking. But the mere fact that I said it to Kenny does not make it true.”
Through the torturous recitation, Lark busied herself picking the white towel lint from her pajamas. A faint smile flashed before she said, “So I’m not ord-nry looking?” It was a deliberate mocking of her accent.
“Not or-di-na-ry at all,” Channing replied, sounding out all the syllables. “Granted, I don’t make a habit of scoring all the women I meet, but I do indeed find you pretty. In fact, you may recall I said those very words to you just this evening in the bar. I looked up and at that instant there was a certain grace about you that struck me as quite fetching.”
A more genuine smile lit Lark’s face this time, but still she avoided looking up. “You did say that. I also like how you say stew-pid, not stoo-pid. It’s so much more emphatic….as in too stew-pid to get through medical school.”
“Euunh, that.” Channing clenched her teeth and hissed. “What happened is that Kenny made some crude remark about Payton being a ‘closet queen,’ so he had me in a mood. He then pointed out that any woman who was my type would have to be smart. Bearing in mind that I was attempting to thwart his impulse to meddle, I thoughtlessly replied that you were hardly a genius, since you’d not finished your medical training. It’s quite clear to me that you’re smart. Your company obviously trusts you to carry out complex analyses that stew-pid persons could not. I’m rather impressed by it if you want to know the truth.”
The cabin grew increasingly claustrophobic as she waited interminably for Lark’s response. The space simply wasn’t large enough for the both of them if they couldn’t bury this agonizing rift. As the seconds ticked by, Channing made mental plans for her retreat. She’d gather her pillow and blanket, find Oliver and get his keys to the Peugeot.
“That one hit kind of close to home,” Lark finally said. “Because you were sort of right, I washed out of my residency before I ever started. I was smart enough I guess, but just barely. Everyone else was brilliant. I had to work twice as hard just to keep up, and all the pressure of having to make snap decisions and doctors grilling us constantly and trying to trip us up… I was exhausted. Another four years and I’d have thrown myself on the bonfire.”
In just those few words, her indignation visibly collapsed. All the ire she’d aimed outward was now turned on herself.
“Lark, there’s no shame in making whatever decision was best for you. We all should know ourselves so well.”
“The problem is that I’ve never taken responsibility for it. It’s one of those lies you tell over and over until you believe it yourself. That it’s Ma’s fault for not taking care of herself, for having a stroke and getting diabetes right when I was supposed to start my residency. Or my sister’s fault for not stepping up to help out. Or Bess’s for not wanting to move to Delaware where my residency match was. Believe me, I’ve got all the excuses down pat.” She raised her face to blink back a welling of tears. “You’re the smart one, Channing. Wellesley, Harvard. I figured you saw through it.”
“There’s nothing to see through. As far as I’m concerned, you’re exactly who you say you are.”
“And who is that?”
“You’re…” Her mind raced back through the hours they’d spent together. She’d groused about Payton, about Poppa…about Kenny’s absurd proposal. Had she posed even a single query of Lark? “You’re someone I want to know.”
Lark gaped at her dubiously and then laughed. “That was desperate.”
“Yes, it appears I’ve quite the gift for conceit. But now it’s my turn to be honest, all right? I’ve enjoyed my time with you, even on the plane when I wasn’t strictly capable of enjoying anyone. I find you kind and compassionate. I’ve needed that more than usual of late, but I don’t want my needs to be all I am to you. You deserve better.” Her careless words to Kenny, her self-absorbed grumbling. And the vain assumption that Lark would say yes to anything. “If you would graciously indulge me for another few hours, I shall attempt to prove my worth starting first thi
ng tomorrow. It’s to be your day in Amsterdam. I want to show you the grandest time.”
A candid chuckle from Lark finally drained a fair bit of the tension from the room. “I should warn you, not all of me is kind and compassionate. But if you’d like to put me on a pedestal for a day or so, who am I to be anything but accommodating?”
“So we have a deal?”
“We do…on one condition. You have to tell me the truth.” She wagged a finger between them. “Is there something going on here, or am I imagining things? Either answer is okay…I just need to know so I don’t make a fool of myself.”
“Do you need a verbal answer…or could we maybe…” She slid from her bed to Lark’s and took a fistful of wet hair. With a tug that was almost fierce, she brought Lark’s mouth to hers for a decisive kiss.
Lark responded with quickening intensity, stroking…caressing…her tongue tickling Channing’s lips.
Their breath came in gulps and before Channing knew it, she’d guided Lark backward on the narrow bed and fallen atop her. Her hips writhed with excitement as her hands found the bare skin of Lark’s stomach beneath the loose knit top.
A flat palm pressed firmly against her chest. “Wait.”
“All right.” Channing sat up straight, mentally dousing herself with cold water. “What have I done now?”
“Nothing, but…” Lark squirmed until she too was sitting up. “This feels too much like makeup sex. I don’t want our first time to be like that.”
If anyone knew makeup sex, it was Channing. Payton had promised it implicitly each time she criticized Channing’s work or spent another long holiday with her family. It always came with an undercurrent that made it feel transactional.
“We can’t have that, can we?” She leaned in and planted a loud, smacking kiss just above Lark’s ear. “But you have your answer about what I think is going on. Next time’s up to you.”
After an elongated groan to announce her suffering, she gave Lark one last peck on the lips and headed for the shower. Several seconds of icy spray cooled her body, but it was hardly enough to chill her thoughts. Lark would be in England for only two more weeks, three at the most. That was all they’d have together unless she decided to go back to Boston too.
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