The Hike(21)

Paul shook his head. ‘Hardly. Ginny’s been enjoying winding you up and Tristan’s been doing the same with me. I have frequent urges to push them both over the side of the mountain.’

Cat’s stomach flipped. She forced out a laugh. ‘And then what?’

‘We’d walk back down to that restaurant, have a few beers and ask them to give us a lift down to the car park. We’d tell them the others went on ahead. Plenty of time for us to grab the car and be out of here before anyone realised what we’d done.’

‘It’s an interesting plan, but I don’t think we’d get very far. We’re hardly master criminals, are we?’

‘Who needs to be a master criminal when you’ve got the perfect place to make a murder look like an accident? Those hikers warned us early on . . .’

‘You’ve been watching too many crime dramas.’ She paused, trying to think of a way to change the subject. Because as much as it was meant to be a bit of fun, to lighten the mood, it had disturbed her that he’d said it, even in jest. ‘Let’s catch up with the others. I’ll try to keep a lid on it with Ginny.’

‘Well, at least until we get back to the hot tub.’

‘Good point. We could drown her in it.’

Paul started laughing, and couldn’t seem to stop himself. It was out of proportion to what she’d just said. But she laughed along with him, keeping up the charade. She was not happy to be in his company, and she had a feeling that he also felt uneasy in hers – like he knew that Cat had a plan and he wasn’t going to like it. He couldn’t have failed to notice that she had pulled away from his every attempt at being physically close to her. He’d seemed distracted. Distant, for a lot of the day. Gluing himself to Tristan’s side, despite all the ribbing. It was almost as if he didn’t want to talk to Cat. But of course, she knew why. And she was fed up with it being brushed under the carpet.

She decided to give him one last chance.

‘We should talk about it, you know,’ she said.

Paul’s laughter stopped abruptly. ‘Not here.’

She sighed. ‘Not here. Not now. When, then? And where? I’ve tried and tried at home but all you do is change the subject. When the allegations were first made, you couldn’t bloody stop talking about it. Begging for reassurance from me that you would be OK . . .’

‘That’s when I thought it was going to be a straightforward thing. It just dragged on so long . . . and I don’t want it in my head. And it is in my head, I can assure you. Do you really need it in yours?’

‘All you can do is keep telling the truth, Paul. It’s her word against yours. And you say you didn’t do anything—’

Paul stopped walking and grabbed her by the wrist, pulling her close to him. ‘Are you doubting my innocence now? Is it not enough that fucking Tristan keeps asking me what happened at work and why did I really leave, because I never seemed like the burnout type? He’s getting close to the truth, Cat. I don’t want him knowing about this. Do you not understand?’

Cat pulled herself away. Rubbed at her wrists. So he was going to continue to lie about it? Cat knew exactly what he had done to his work colleague. How he’d forced himself on her. Humiliated her. And he had no idea that she knew the truth. She’d done a good job of defending him. Because she actually had believed him. Until the photos that he forgot to delete showed otherwise. Well, that was fine. It made everything she had planned for later so much easier to deal with.

‘Oi, you two? Have your feet stopped working?’ Tristan yelled. He’d stopped up ahead. Ginny was standing beside him with her hands on her hips, her face squinting up at the sun.

‘Coming,’ Paul called to them, giving Tristan a little wave. ‘Come on,’ he said to Cat. His voice was gentle now, and that just annoyed Cat more. He thought she was still on his side. But he was very wrong about that. They started walking, Cat keeping her distance from Paul but trying not to make it look too obvious to the others.

‘This isn’t over, Paul,’ she said, under her breath. ‘I am sick and tired of liars. I’m fed up with people thinking that they can get one over on me, somehow. Like I’m this soft touch, just because I like to do things properly and I don’t like to fight.’ She sighed. She was wasting her breath. ‘I think you’re right about the altitude and the heat, though.’ She picked up the pace and Paul carried on beside her. They were close to the others now. ‘At least I don’t feel sick anymore.’

Ginny overheard. ‘Oh . . . you felt sick? And dizzy? And you switched to water last night while we all carried on with the shots? Wonder what on earth could be wrong with you, Kitty-Cat.’ She looked pointedly at Cat’s stomach, smirked. Then turned away and carried on walking.

Tristan raised an eyebrow at her, but said nothing. She hoped he hadn’t picked up on Ginny’s insinuation. Paul gave her a brief glance then turned away. She thought he looked uncomfortable, and it made her feel uneasy. She was thirty-two years old. Would it be the worst thing if she was pregnant? They’d always said they didn’t want children, but that had been a few years ago, and now everything had changed. She laid a hand on her flat belly, wondering what might be going on deep inside.

Would a pregnancy ruin her plans? Maybe. Maybe not. She glanced around at the others. It was too soon to tell.