At First Sight, Hannah Sunderland [thriller books to read txt] 📗

you, that …’ I paused for dramatic effect ‘… that you’d be the only one that I ever wanted to go scatter cushion shopping with.’

He chuckled and pulled on his seatbelt, sat forward and clapped his hands together. ‘So, where to next?’

‘Home.’ I sat up and pushed the key into the ignition. ‘Do you want me to drop you at yours?’

‘I wouldn’t mind helping you take all of this into the house.’ He gestured over his shoulder at the mountain of pillows behind him. ‘You know, somethin’ people don’t get about pillows, is that they’re just so … heavy. I wouldn’t want you strainin’ yourself.’

‘Oh, and you’re just the big strong man to help me, are you?’

‘Yeah. I mean, I’ve seen the guns on yer and all. But I’m just sayin’ that yer might, y’know, want the help.’

‘Okay.’ I grinned and clipped in my seatbelt. Charlie reached over and pushed the button for the radio.

‘Oh, the radio doesn’t work. Hasn’t for years since Ned took his ex-wife to the safari park and the aerial got torn off by a particularly spiteful macaque.’

He stared at me for a moment, waiting for me to indicate that I was joking, but I wasn’t.

‘There might be some CDs in there,’ I said, pointing to the glove box.

He leaned forward and pulled it open. ‘You can tell a lot about a person by what’s in their glove box,’ he said, bending double in the seat to rifle through it.

‘Well, it’s Ned’s glove box, so you won’t learn anything about me from in there.’ He pulled out a decrepit old A to Z, a pair of woolly gloves that looked as if the moths had been at them, a packet of tissues and three CDs, held together with the sticky, decade-old glue of a melted boiled sweet.

‘Delightful,’ he said, pulling on the cases until he prised them apart with a sound like a wax strip being torn from a thigh. ‘Is this guy for real?’ He turned to me with lowered brows.

‘What do you mean?’

‘The man’s radio doesn’t work, the only alternative he has is the CD player and these are all he can bring to the table?’ He held out the options. A sun-faded audiobook of The Hobbit, the soundtrack to Phantom of the Opera and The Best of Michael Bolton.

‘Hey, don’t knock Bolton,’ I said, taking the CD from him and turning it over to see the track list.

‘Oh, please don’t tell me you’re a fan or I might have to rethink this whole “friendship” thing.’

I turned in my seat to face him, holding up the image of peak Nineties Michael Bolton, his face slightly concealed by gooey red sugar. ‘This man’s voice has both the raw masculine power of an Eighties wrestler, whilst also being as silky smooth as caramel. There’s no one else like him.’

‘You mean to say that his voice is like Hulk Hogan covered in butterscotch?’

‘No, caramel,’ I repeated. ‘Have you even listened to him or is this like when people say they don’t like a food they’ve never tried?’

‘He’s the “Lean on Me” guy isn’t he?’

‘Oh, Charlie.’ I chortled through my words. ‘Charlie, Charlie, Charlie. He’s so much more than that.’ I took the slightly sticky disk from the case and slid it into the player. The first soulful bars of ‘Time, Love and Tenderness’ played out into the car and I balled a fist and drew it slowly down through the air in front of my face as I sang. I got so into the song that I almost forgot that Charlie was in the car and when I opened my eyes, I found him leaning back against the inside of the door, his eyebrows raised.

‘Sorry,’ I said, regaining my composure. I turned the volume down a touch and placed my hands on the wheel. ‘I can’t be held responsible for anything I do while that golden-haired, gravel-voiced man is singing.’

‘Clearly.’ The smile was still tugging at his mouth. ‘I apologise. I was wrong about him.’

‘You bet your ass you were,’ I responded as I checked behind me and pulled out of the space.

The headlights dazzled against the wall of the house as I pulled up onto the inclined drive and shut off the engine just as the first tinkling notes of ‘How Am I Supposed to Live Without You’ came on. I turned to Charlie, who was still eyeing me with wariness, and expelled a sigh full of a contentment that only musical nostalgia can bring. I was raised on Bolton, moulded by him. Like Bane only more likely to seduce you than kill you.

‘So,’ I said, ‘have I changed your perspective on the great man himself?

‘How could you not with passion like that?’ He breathed a laugh and reached for the door handle.

We piled all of the cushions onto the living room floor, between the sofa and the rarely used fireplace, the floor becoming an uneven rainbow patchwork. As I stood at the edge of the ocean of pillows, Charlie munching gracelessly on his bag of gummy bears beside me, I thought to myself that I may have gone slightly overboard. Did we even have enough places to put all of these?

‘Well, there’s only one thing for it now,’ Charlie said, scrunching the top of his gummy bear bag, turning around and lowering himself back onto the cushions. He wriggled around for a moment, the pillows shifting into place beneath him. After a few seconds he let out a long, contented sigh and closed his eyes, his arms splayed out at either side of him. ‘You comin’ in? The water’s great.’

I knelt down and crawled to a spot that was an acceptable distance from him, turned over and lay down. I settled into position the cushions rising between us and popping out from under my body like when you stand on a pool float that slips from under your feet. The cushions formed a small barricade between us and I was glad of it, because at