door and bade him enter. ‘Your usual. Your mini-bar has been stocked with the American beer you like. The bathroom has extra towels –’
Here came Anto. ‘Where would you like your bags, Mr Fay?’
Now! Now! This was her moment, when she stood up to the fat-shaming creep, when she handed him back the shame he’d foisted on her.
Last time you suggested that Anto shove them up my butt? Is that still your favoured place?
But when she opened her mouth, the words wouldn’t come out.
She needed them to be said. Her self-respect depended on it.
‘On the rack,’ Mr Fay muttered. ‘Whatever.’
Anto dropped them and scooted away.
She could still say it, there was still time … She heard her voice say, meekly, ‘Would you like me to take you through the room’s features?’
‘No.’ He sounded tired and bad-tempered. ‘Just get your fat ass out of here.’
Quick! Say something now. Anything!
Time slowed down. She stood, motionless, in the middle of the room. He frowned, looking at her with mild curiosity. Her mouth opened again: this time she was going to say something.
‘I need to take a nap,’ he said.
Her mouth shut. Her body moved. Then she was out in the corridor, with the free-falling desolation of anticlimax.
She’d only gone a couple of steps when fury at having squandered her chance blazed in her. She was raging at herself – for being a target, for being a coward.
She couldn’t bear feeling this way. Ravenous emptiness and hunger erupted, filling her with a great roar. She had a desperate need for food and more food, to pile it into her, to muffle this appalling discomfort.
Was this what Peggy had been talking about? The connection between unbearable feelings and the desire to numb herself?
Probably. She’d just never seen it before.
Did this mean there really was something wrong with her? Call it an illness, an addiction, the name didn’t really matter. Whatever it was, she’d thought she had a handle on it, and she clearly hadn’t.
What had she been thinking with her crazy plan to challenge Billy Fay? She could never have pulled it off. He was too sure of himself – and she … wasn’t …
A swirl of dirty emotions was sucking her down into the dark and she wanted to binge and vomit.
Well, she did, but she didn’t. Her feelings craved a painkiller but she already felt terrible loss. Afterwards she would wish she hadn’t done it.
The solution, when it appeared, felt like balm on a burn: she’d ring Peggy and plead for an appointment. Today, if possible.
She stepped into a quiet nook between two bedrooms and rang the hospital. The switchboard operator said, ‘Mrs Kennedy is with a patient.’
Of course she was with a patient, but Peggy had been so consistently available in the past that the let-down was disorienting.
‘I can connect you to her voicemail.’
‘Okay. Um, no, wait, it’s all right.’ She wondered if she should ring Peggy on her mobile. Peggy had said she could, but that had been back when she’d been Peggy’s client.
Actually, patient: that was the word. She’d been Peggy’s patient.
Could she call while she was with another patient? Wouldn’t that be terribly wrong? But if she didn’t get to talk to her, she was going to go out and buy far too much food, then eat it.
Peggy’s appointments began on the hour and lasted for fifty minutes: if she called her at about five to two, she might pick up.
But when Cara made the call at five to two, Peggy’s mobile went straight to message. Quickly she hung up.
‘Cara,’ Raoul said. ‘Two o’clock. Your lunch.’
It was all over. She had no more say in this. She had no more fight.
Except there was no place she could do it. ‘Her’ little bathroom in the basement was far too risky. She considered the ladies’ room in another nearby fancy hotel. But that wouldn’t give her the privacy she needed. Wildly, she considered renting a hotel room – which was such an extreme idea that sanity began to return.
From the far side of the busy street, Ferdia watched the door, waiting for Nell. He’d arrived early, feeling like he was losing his damn mind. She wanted to see him. That must mean something –
The heavy Georgian door opened from the inside and he tensed in readiness. Maybe she was already there. But the woman emerging from the building wasn’t Nell. For a moment the confusion was too much. What the hell …? What was Izzy doing here? Dropping in on a