we get dessert?’ she asks, sitting down and grabbing for the menu.
I’m torn. My thighs don’t need the calories but, as Kate reminds me, ‘Toby’s paying,’ and I could use the extra carbs in my belly to soak up all the alcohol, especially if we’re heading to a bar next.
We order chocolate mousse and a Portuguese custard tart, which are both deliciously decadent, though Kate barely touches either. She’s become all fidgety and keeps pulling out her phone to check it. It buzzes in her hand and she frowns at whatever message pops up, then mutters under her breath.
‘Everything OK?’ I ask.
‘Fine,’ she says, furiously tapping a reply. ‘Just an angry client. Wants the impossible.’ She signals the waiter for the bill and then stands abruptly as the phone starts to buzz once more in her hand.
‘I have to take this,’ she says, already striding for the door.
I watch her through the window as she starts pacing up and down the pavement outside the restaurant, angrily gesticulating as she talks on the phone, and I wonder what the call’s about. A part of me secretly hopes that whatever it is will curtail the bar and clubbing adventure she has planned.
As I watch Kate a waiter comes and places the bill in front of me and I glance down at it, shocked at the amount – almost five hundred euro, mostly for the wine and champagne, but still, that is the most expensive sardine in history – before sliding it over to Kate’s side of the table. I feel awkward but she did say she’d pay. Or rather, that Toby would.
Kate returns a minute later and sits down, shoving her phone into her bag. Her face is red and her mascara has run a little.
‘Who was it? What happened?’ I ask in alarm. It’s not like Kate to cry. In fact I think maybe in the whole time I’ve known her I’ve only seen it happen a couple of times and once was while watching The Little Mermaid when we were hungover in our twenties, and she only cried then because she was upset Ariel gave her voice away for a man.
‘It was Toby,’ she admits, dabbing at her eyes. ‘The credit card company called him. They’d flagged unusually high spending.’
‘Oh,’ I say, trying not to glance in the direction of the bill.
‘Damn,’ she mutters, chewing on the skin by her thumbnail. ‘Bastard’s gone and put a stop on the card.’
I glance at the bill in front of her. She notices it too then bursts out laughing. ‘Shit! If only he’d waited five minutes.’ She rustles around in her bag for her wallet and fishes out another card. ‘Let’s hope this one works,’ she says, laying it down.
‘Why don’t I help?’ I say. ‘We can go halves.’
‘No,’ she says firmly, shaking her head. ‘I’ve got it. I’m the one who wanted to come here. Besides, once the divorce is finalised I’ll be laughing all the way to the bank.’
‘How long will that take?’ I ask as the waiter brings the card reader over.
‘Who knows? My lawyer says it could take up to a year, maybe longer if he contests, which he will because he’s a shithead and doesn’t think I’m owed a penny. After putting up with him, though, I should say I’m owed the lot. I had to get tested for herpes and gonorrhoea thanks to his dirty little escapades. My lawyer’s putting it all in the papers. The judge will totally rule in my favour.’
‘But until then?’ I ask.
‘I’m earning enough,’ she says, waving a hand. ‘Don’t worry.’ She taps her number into the machine the waiter is holding and luckily the card is accepted. I breathe a sigh of relief. It’s not that Rob and I are broke – we both earn good salaries, though I’ve not been earning while I’ve been on maternity leave – but our mortgage is large and we’re saving up for an extension on the house. He’d go mad if he saw I’d spent five hundred quid on one dinner.
‘OK then,’ Kate says, with a dangerous sparkle in her eyes, ‘shall we go?’
Chapter Four
As we get in the Uber Kate’s phone buzzes again. She glances at it quickly. ‘It’s Toby,’ she says, huffing. She shoves the phone back in her bag. ‘He’s paranoid. Wants to know who I’m here with. As if it’s any of his business anymore who I’m with or what I do. For God’s sake,’ she says, as the phone