Em scooped the last of the salsa onto a tortilla chip. “I’ve really missed this, babes. It seems like ages since we had girl time, and soon, you won’t be here to do it with.”
Tally lay down on the sofa and put her feet in Em’s lap. Although she’d promised Cash she’d talk to Pete before making a decision, one brief chat with Em on Sunday night had sealed it. “I’ve missed it too. You’ll come to visit lots, won’t you?”
“Just try and keep me away. When are you talking to Pete?”
She groaned. “I’m putting that off as long as I can. I feel bad, you know. He’s put so much personal time into helping me build the beginnings of a career. It feels like I’m throwing it back in his face.”
“It’s not wasted, Tal. You can freelance. Loads do.”
“Yeah, I know. But I think Pete had bigger plans for me.”
Em shrugged. “It’s your life. It’s what you want that matters, and you want a life with Cash. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“I’m such a cliché, Em. Career all the way, until some guy comes along and I turn into a woman from the fifties.”
“Hardly. Writing’s in your blood. I can’t see you joining the Women’s Institute and holding coffee mornings for vacuous housewives whose conversation consists of who managed to make the lightest choux pastry last week.”
Tally laughed. “Me either.”
“You need to think differently about your career, that’s all. You always wanted to write a novel someday. Why not do a biography on Cash?”
“You’re joking,” Tally scoffed. “He’s bad enough about keeping up with the interviews he’s contractually obliged to do, let alone spending hours and hours in interviews with me. He’s one of the most private people I’ve ever met.”
With secrets he refuses to share.
“So write about the circuit. What it’s like for the families. How hard the players work. You could do a real behind-the-scenes exposé.”
Tally brushed off the niggling doubt about Cash’s secrets and pondered Em’s idea. It wasn’t a bad one. “I’ll give it some thought.”
“You should. And you need to speak to Pete before the weekend, especially if that’s when you’re planning to tell Cash you’ll move in.”
She nodded, dreading telling Pete, certain he would be furious. He still didn’t like Cash very much, and he’d think she was throwing her career away on a guy who might lose interest any minute. But she knew Cash. He might not have said he loved her in so many words, but he’d done everything else except that.
“I’ll talk to him tomorrow.”
* * *
Nausea churned in her stomach as she waited for Pete to finish his meeting. When she’d asked for some time in his diary that morning, he’d given her a hard look as though he already knew what was coming, which of course he couldn’t possibly. She’d gone over what to say a hundred times in her mind but still wasn’t sure exactly how to begin.
Pete’s office door opened, and the guy he’d been meeting with walked out. Pete appeared at the door and crooked his finger at her.
“Oh, God,” she muttered under her breath. Her nerves were frayed as she walked the seventeen steps from her desk to Pete’s office. The last time she’d been this anxious was when she was trying to persuade him to let her go to the Dorchester, back when knowing Cash had been nothing but a fantasy.
She sat down and crossed her legs then uncrossed them again.
“Whatever it is you’ve got to tell me, spit it out, Tally, before you have a heart attack.”
“Pete, I… I don’t know where to start.”
“Are you pregnant?” he asked, his voice soft and warm.
“Jesus, no! Of course not. What do you take me for?”
“Well, that’s something at least. Not that I wouldn’t want that for you one day, but you’ve got a whole career to build. There’s plenty of time for family. Need to win that Pulitzer Prize first,” he said with a grin.
She covered her face with her hands. This was so much worse than she’d imagined.
“Tally, come on, now. Tell me. It can’t be that bad.”
“I’m moving in with Cash,” she blurted out.
She held her breath, waiting for the explosion. Except there was none. Pete’s mouth hung open in an expression of stunned surprise.
“Say something,” she said, gripping the sides of the chair.
“I––isn’t it a bit sudden?”
“I guess.” She shrugged. “But he makes me happy, Pete.”
Pete stood up and walked around his desk. He tugged her into a warm cuddle. “Were you so afraid to tell me? Am I that much of an ogre?”
The tears she’d been struggling to hold back spilled over. “No, of course you aren’t,” she said, wiping her nose on the back of her hand.
Pete reached into his pocket and pulled out a tissue.
“Thanks.” She blew her nose. “I know how much effort you’ve put into helping me become a journalist, that’s all. I didn’t want you to think I was throwing it all away.”
“Is Cash asking you to give up writing?”
“No. In fact he’s the one encouraging me to continue. He suggested freelancing.”
Pete nodded, and she could have sworn his approval of Cash increased slightly. “It’s definitely an option, especially as you’ll be travelling quite a bit, I expect. I could use a roaming reporter.”
Tally kissed his cheek. “You’re the best. It will take me a while to build up a reputation, so I’ll need all the help I can get.”
“I doubt Cash will let you starve in the meantime.” Then Pete pulled a face. “I suppose I’ll have to be nicer to him from now on.”
“You look a little disappointed.”
“As long as he treats you right, he’ll do, but I meant what I said a few weeks ago. That boy hurts you, and I’ll make his life a misery.”
Tally chuckled. “Can you keep it to yourself for a while that I’m leaving? It won’t be for a few weeks anyway. It’ll take me a while to get sorted, so I won’t be moving until after Cash gets back from Indian Wells and Miami.”
“It’s our little secret. I presume Em knows, though?”
“Yeah. Difficult to keep much from her,” Tally said with a raised eyebrow.
Pete laughed. “That’s an understatement. Jeez, I’m going to miss you, Tal. If I’d thought this would be the outcome of sending you to that bloody foundation gala, I’d have stuck to my guns and sent Kaminsky.”
She chuckled and hugged him again. “I’m going to miss you too. Anyway, I’d better get back to work. I have a tyrant of an editor who has very unreasonable demands, and if I’m late with my article…”
“He’ll hang you out to dry,” Pete said.
* * *
Tally unlocked the front door and kicked her shoes off without unbuckling them. Exhaustion washed over her as she glanced at her watch. Eleven. The flat was in darkness apart from a lamp Em had left on in the living room. Her stomach rumbled, but the thought of making a meal wasn’t exactly appealing at that time of night. She opened the fridge and spotted a pot of beans. Tally heated the beans in the microwave, scoffing them straight out of the plastic pot. Then she made a cup of hot chocolate and went to bed.
She’d had several missed calls from Cash but hadn’t wanted to break her concentration by speaking to him during the day. If she had, that would have been the end of her productivity. She had originally planned to wait until getting to Ireland on Friday to tell him about her decision, but now Pete knew, and because he’d been so wonderful, her excitement had gone into overdrive, and she couldn’t wait to blurt it out.
Cash must have been waiting for her call because he answered on the first ring.
“Hi. It’s late. Is everything okay?”
“I’m fine. Work is crazy, and I wasted half the morning unnecessarily worrying over something and nothing, and it put me behind, so I had to work late.”
“What were you worrying about?”
She hesitated. “Telling Pete I’m moving in with you.”
Cash’s sharp intake of breath was unmistakeable. “You’re sure?”
“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life. I was going to tell you on Friday, but I couldn’t wait.”
Cash’s delight was evident in his voice. “Baby, you’ve made me so happy. How did Pete take it?”
“He was amazingly supportive.”
“Does this mean you’re coming to Indian Wells?”
“I can’t,” she said, her tone glum. “I need to work my notice at the paper.”
“Oh.”
“I’m disappointed too.”
“Never mind. Soon, I won’t be letting you out of my sight.”
Any lingering doubts she might have had fluttered away. This was the man she was going to spend the rest of her life with. Happiness flowed through her like a fast-running stream after a deluge of rain. She wasn’t sure what made her so lucky, but she wasn’t about to start questioning the direction her life had taken.
The future had never looked so good.