The Morning After the Night Before

‘Just one correction, Izzy. I will always be troubled—intimately—by how you feel.’

‘He did not!’ Poppy’s forkful of scrambled eggs suspended just before it reached her gaping mouth.

‘I kid you not,’ Izzy said. ‘Those exact words.’

‘Oh, my God. What a fantastic line.’

‘Tori!’

‘Sorry, sorry,’ Tori placated. ‘I mean, bastard!’

‘Thank you.’

Around them, Ignite’s busiest time burbled on, people nicking in for takeaway coffee before their Saturday jobs, others settling in for a breakfast as leisurely as Izzy and her friends. It made a confidential conversation more challenging but the buzzing noise of customers, clanking crockery and the music pumping out of the café speakers afforded some level of privacy.

Izzy hastily brought them up to speed with the events of the previous night.

‘I have to say, Iz, given how thunderous your face was when I left the kitchen, this is not how I expected the rest of your evening to pan out.’

‘You and me both, Poppy.’

‘I can totally see it,’ Tori announced. ‘He was too cute. And that accent … sigh.’

‘If I didn’t know how clever you were, Toz, I’d be shaking my head now.’

‘What?’ She shrugged. ‘I just appreciate pretty things. So, was he purely ornamental or was he any good?’

Insane heat flooded up from under Izzy’s T-shirt.

‘We’ll take that as a yes.’ Poppy grinned.

‘I’m not comfortable talking about this.’

‘You started it,’ Poppy pointed out reasonably.

‘I mean I’m not comfortable talking about the … details.’

‘I’m sure Prince Harry isn’t similarly constrained this morning.’

No. He wouldn’t be. Something told her one-night stands came much more naturally to him.

‘Look at it this way, Iz,’ Tori started. ‘Do you have feelings for him?’

‘Not good ones,’ she muttered.

‘Did he treat you well when you were his employee?’

He’d treated her with the same under-informed judgement she’d battled all her youth. ‘Not overly.’

‘Did he ever donate a kidney to you?’

An eyebrow lift was better than an answer. Not that Tori was waiting for one.

‘And do you ever plan on seeing him again?’

‘Absolutely not.’

‘Then you owe him nothing, least of all your confidence.’

And that was why Izzy had been Tori’s friend since sixth form, when she’d first arrived at Trenton as a scholarship entry. Unassailable logic, no matter how disguised beneath the crazy hair.

‘I guess not.’

‘So spill!’

She glanced between her two best friends, opened her mouth for a mute heartbeat and then just let the words tumble. All about how good Harry had been. All about how feminine she’d felt when she was in his arms and how forbidden it all was. How she should have done the whole one-night-stand thing long before now, and how she would categorically not be doing it again. About how she was still secretly thrumming from his touch and more than a little sore in more than a few places.

About what a jerk he was.

The girls listened intently, exclaimed or squeezed her arm in the right places and generally fulfilled their obligations under the universal BFF contract.

‘So Mitchell sucks in the office but rocks it in bed,’ Tori summarised.

‘Pretty much.’

‘Well, context is everything,’ Poppy rationalised. ‘And clearly he comes into his own one-on-one.’

My wordy lordy, yes.

Until he spoke.

Ignite’s maître d’, Marco, swung by their table to check on their breakfasts and chatted for a few moments. But the impatience stamped clearly on their three faces soon sent him drifting professionally off to be charming to someone else.

‘So … I saw a few half-hearted circles in the positions vacant section of yesterday’s paper,’ Poppy nudged. ‘Anything interesting?’

‘Plenty of jobs if I want to do the same thing I’ve been doing for years.’

‘And you don’t?’

Nope. Not even a little bit. ‘Time for something new.’

‘Out of finance?’

‘I still love numbers but … not in

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