she could trust. But that didn’t really matter in the long run, did it? If something was going on that looked like a story worth writing about, they’d write it. She knew that only too well.
‘Can’t we just escape for five minutes, India? Go somewhere quiet, somewhere private…’
‘I wasn’t aware privacy bothered you two anymore,’ Bobby said, sitting down beside them and taking a long sip of his rather brightly coloured cocktail. Miguel was running the bar for the night so all kinds of weird and wonderful concoctions were being created, with most of them more colourful than any rainbow India had ever seen.
Dominic looked at India but she just shrugged, climbing off his knee and standing up, repositioning her top.
Bobby looked at the two of them, all wide eyed and innocent. ‘I’m only saving you both from yourselves. I mean, there was a time when you at least dragged your men into the nearest toilet for a quick one up against the wall, Angel. Now you seem to prefer the more public option.’
She stuck her tongue out at him, pulling Dominic up out of his seat.
‘Very ladylike, Princess,’ Bobby tutted, turning his attention back to his cocktail. ‘I’m just tying to keep you on the straight and narrow. That’s my job, after all.’
‘Oh, she veered off the straight and narrow a long time ago,’ Kenny smirked, joining them all at the booth.
‘Who asked you?’ India said, but she couldn’t help smiling as she looked at her best friend. Her very best friend. The one man who’d been constant in her life for the past twenty years. The one man who would always be there, no matter what, she knew that now. She knew that. He looked good tonight, too. The hair was shorter than he usually wore it due to the film he’d just finished shooting, but the beard was slowly making a reappearance, and he still carried off that scruffy “rock star” look to its ultimate best in old jeans, black T-shirt and his favourite heavy biker boots. Free-spirited, handsome Kenny Ross. He may have hit middle-age, but middle-age certainly hadn’t hit him.
‘Who knows you better?’ Kenny winked, and India burst out laughing. Those cocktails of Miguel’s were starting to take effect now and she clung onto Dominic as she briefly lost her balance.
‘Actually, I want a word with you,’ she said, looking straight at Kenny, who looked right back at her, his stare making her stomach flip over slightly and she squeezed Dominic’s hand tighter, leaning in against him. She was definitely laying off those cocktails now; they were having some very strange side effects in her opinion.
‘Would you like that word now?’ Kenny asked, still staring at her. ‘Or, are you too busy?’
She looked at Dominic, whose expression told her he’d really rather they just got out of there and got down to something he knew they both wanted to do, but India needed to know something first. Otherwise she was only going to be distracted.
‘Give me five minutes, baby, okay?’
‘Do I have much choice?’ Dominic asked, pulling her against him for a long, slow kiss. He wasn’t letting her go that easy. Kenny Ross might not be a threat anymore, but Dominic still wanted him to know where he stood as far as India was concerned.
‘She doesn’t give anyone much choice in anything,’ Kenny said, and India swung round to look at him, letting go of Dominic and grabbing Kenny’s hand, pulling him away from everyone else.
‘What the hell was that supposed to mean?’
‘What?’
‘Oh, quit with the innocent act, Kenny. It doesn’t suit you. That comment, back there. Was that some kind of dig? Because I didn’t deserve that.’
He pushed a hand through his jet-black hair, looking down at the ground for a second. A momentary lapse, that’s all it had been. Thinking aloud. A mistake.
‘I’m sorry.’ He looked up at her, her beautiful blue eyes confused, with good reason. ‘I didn’t mean anything by it, okay? I didn’t.’
She couldn’t be bothered to argue with him. It didn’t matter anyway; she had more important things to worry about. ‘What’s going on with you and Charley?’
‘Nothing’s going on with me and Charley.’
‘I said quit with the innocent act, Kenny. Look, you know me, don’t you? You know me inside out, wouldn’t you agree?’
‘Yeah… what’s your point?’
‘I know you too. So, what’s going on? And if you tell me it’s nothing again I swear, I’ll hit you. And I can hit hard, you know that.’