emphatically, as if she’d never met someone who did such a pedestrian job in her entire life, which in fact was quite likely.
“Aye,” said Cormac. “I follow up—try and keep people out of hospital. Lot of post-op stuff, wound care, that kind of stuff.”
“Oh, so you’re not in a hospital?” said Portia, frowning her perfectly Botoxed brow. “Do you ride around on a little bicycle? How adorable!”
Kalitha, a slender art dealer Larissa had met during a course at the Courtauld, simply glanced at him up and down, then turned to Ithica sitting next to her and carried on with the conversation as if he weren’t there, which made Larissa feel an anxious tremor of annoyance and shame. She had thought that this would be nice, or different, but instead they were all being rude and snotty, and she was completely annoyed that they were theoretically her friends.
Portia turned her attention to the cocktail menu.
“What do you want to drink?” Larissa asked him.
Cormac was boggling at the prices, utterly astounded. Cocktails were £15! Minimum! £15!! He looked up. If he had to get a round in, that would be £75. Getting a round in at Eck’s was £12. He had the money—he didn’t spend much at home and his cottage didn’t cost much to rent. And he wasn’t tight; he was always the first to put his hand in his pocket. It was just the very idea of it; spending so much on so little seemed to him not so much worrying as totally and utterly immoral, when £75 could buy so much or do so much.
A worse thought struck him. He was here with four women, which meant as a gentleman he’d normally insist on paying for all of their drinks. If everyone had four cocktails—and, oh my God, he just realized two of them were drinking from a bottle of champagne—he was going to spend as much as the price of a small car.
It was not Larissa’s fault, but it wouldn’t have occurred to her in a million years what was going through his mind. Money had simply never, ever been remotely an issue to worry about, and the mentality of adding things up like that had never been a part of her. Plus, she’d assumed she’d be getting it anyway; nurses were really super poor, right? He must know it was her club and her card behind the bar.
“What will you have?”
“I’ll . . . I’ll just go to the bar,” said Cormac unhappily, wondering if he could ask for tap water when he got there.
Kalitha flicked her perfectly made-up eyes to him. “Uh, they’ll take your order here?” she said, as if explaining something to a child, just as an incredibly gorgeous, young model-type person in a smart black outfit that patently cost more than anything Cormac himself had ever possessed came up to them, looking at Cormac expectantly.
“Um, pint of eighty shilling?” said Cormac automatically. He could call his bank and make sure, transfer some money over, probably. Yeah. He’d do that. The crushing thought that these beautiful, groomed creatures might snigger to themselves that he fit the stereotype of Scottish people being miserly was so shaming he wanted to bury himself.
The beautiful model-waitress smiled widely. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what that is?” she said, her voice going up at the end. “I can ask maybe at the bar?”
“It’s a beer . . .”
“All our beers are imported? We have . . .” And she proceeded to reel off a number of names of beers Cormac had never heard before. Finally Cormac stopped her just to stop things from getting completely out of hand.
“Aye. That one,” he said randomly.
The beautiful person smiled. “Wonderful choice?”
Cormac turned to Larissa, but she was emptying the bottle of champagne into a glass and waving the empty bottle about.
“Keep them coming!”
Cormac swallowed carefully.
“Of course!” said the server, and hurried off with another perfect smile.
By the time he had turned back, Kalitha was telling a story about a red carpet that he couldn’t really follow but involved lots of squealing, then every so often Larissa or Portia, who seemed slightly kinder than the others, would attempt to bring him in to the conversation by asking him something about Scotland, and he would turn pink and mutter something very unfunny and uninspiring, not feeling like himself at all, and the others would look at him for a second and he could hear Larissa’s audible disappointment in him for not being a