The Road Trip: The heart-warming new novel from the author of The Flatshare and The Switch Beth O'Leary (ready to read books .TXT) 📖

‘Right.’ I chew my lip. ‘So as much as I do not want Cherry’s stalker in our car . . .’

‘Or sleeping in the same room as us . . .’

‘I think maybe our best bet is to keep him close until the last possible moment, then, umm. Do something. Not tie him up,’ I say, raising a finger.

‘OK. Well, that’s our dastardly plan then,’ Deb says, with satisfaction. ‘Keep our enemy close.’

There’s a knock on the door. We both jump.

‘Hello?’ I say, a bit more nervously than I’d like.

‘Hey, it’s us,’ Dylan says.

I glance at Deb. ‘Come in.’

Dylan blinks at us as he and Marcus head inside.

‘Are you guys all right?’ he says.

‘Where’s Rodney?’ Deb asks them.

Marcus starts emptying his pockets on to the side table – change, phone, wallet.

‘He took the car and drove to get a sleeping bag from a shop nearby,’ he says.

‘He what?’ Deb and I shriek.

Marcus stares at us. ‘He drove to a shop. What’s the matter with you two?’

‘Rodney has the car?’ I ask.

‘What’s wrong, Addie?’ Dylan says.

‘Oh, is this about the insurance?’ Marcus says, rolling his eyes and kicking off his shoes. ‘It’s a ten-minute drive, Addie.’

‘You’re telling me that Rodney has driven off. In our car. Alone.’

‘Yeah, pretty much. Why? Is that a problem?’

THEN

Dylan

When the sun first breaks through in April, Luke and Javier have a week in the UK, so we take a trip to West Wittering Beach – me, Addie, Marcus, Grace, Cherry, Luke and Javier. Things with Addie have been different lately. Ever since I told her I was going to stay with Marcus at the log cabin instead of moving in with her family, she’s been distant, staying at work late, shrugging away sometimes when I move to touch her. I wish I could take the decision back.

Marcus is in a bad place again – now we’re living together I see the evidence of his drinking, and every time Addie comes to the cabin, he’s surly and childish, acting out. I hardly know how to navigate it all, and behind the drama at the log cabin is the drama with my father, whose position on my career plans has – unsurprisingly – not shifted in the slightest.

So it feels glorious to escape for a while and lie on the salt-scented sand with Addie beside me. She’s deep in conversation with Grace, who’s busy lathering Cherry in sun cream; Grace has to keep snagging Cherry by the arm and saying, No, I’m not done yet, darling, because Cherry has the sea in her sights and is clearly struggling not to immediately jump into it.

I try not to find Addie’s friendship with Grace unnerving. I’m not proud of how I behaved with Grace; I was a different person then, and sleeping with the same woman as my best friend had seemed edgy and interesting, when in reality it was quite disturbing and probably not healthy for any of us. Whenever I think of that time I feel ashamed, so naturally I try to think of it as little as possible.

‘Ads? You coming?’ Cherry says, once Grace lets her go. She’s bouncing on her toes; I squint as she sends a shower of sand in the direction of my face. The beach is packed with sunseekers who all seem to have an extraordinary level of kit: there are lobster-patterned windbreakers, innumerable sand buckets, carefully arranged deckchairs, parasols impaled lopsidedly in the sand.

Addie sits up on her elbows. ‘Dylan?’ she asks.

‘I’m reading,’ I say, pointing to my copy of Byron’s Complete Works. ‘Maybe in a bit?’

Cherry drags Addie up. ‘Forget Dylan, he’s boring. You’re not boring,’ she says to Addie, who’s resisting. ‘Come! Swim! Swim!’

Addie caves and they stumble towards the water. I watch Addie, her dark ponytail bouncing, the neat lines of her beautiful body framed against the sea.

‘You’re an idiot,’ Marcus says from beside me. He has his hat over his face to block the sun and his voice is muffled. He’s already drinking, but Luke, Javier and Grace are too, so I try not to worry about it.

‘Oh?’ I say, turning my head to look at him.

He doesn’t move the hat. ‘Do you know how easy it would be for someone else to take her off you right now?’

‘What?’

I glance back to Addie in the water. She’s riding on Cherry’s shoulders, arms waving as she tries to keep steady. Beside me Grace shifts on to her side, towards Marcus, listening, probably after more material for that book of hers. Javier and Luke are making out behind her, wrapped in Javier’s towel; they roll over and gently knock Luke’s beer over, letting it glug into the sand.

‘Oh, you go have fun without me, Addie,’ Marcus says, in a mocking voice. ‘I will just sit here and be boring with my book on the first nice day we have had together in several months.’

Something curdles quietly in my chest as the bad thoughts settle.

‘I thought you would have wanted me to screw this up,’ I say, and I try to keep my tone light, but I’m angry, I think, and surprised at myself. I’m not often angry. ‘I thought you said she was all wrong for me.’

Marcus throws his hat aside as he sits up. ‘Sometimes,’ he says, ‘it is really, really hard to be a good friend to you. I have been a paragon of restraint and you haven’t a bloody clue, have you? Well, fuck it.’

He heads for the water, shucking off his T-shirt as he goes, and I watch as he dives in, swimming up to Cherry and Addie. They shriek when he lunges for Cherry’s legs, and then they’re all in the water, seawater flying up and catching golden in the sun, and I watch Addie swipe her hair out of her eyes, laughing.

Beside me Grace lies back with a yawn.

‘Is it just me,’ I