‘Should I?’

She stared at him a moment longer. ‘Hold on.’ She let herself out from behind the bar, walked over to the swing door, and as he stood there, bemused, she opened it and let it swing back in her face, lifting a hand and opening her mouth as if to say something.

She opened the door again and stood there in front of him. ‘Recognize me now?’

He blinked. Jess could almost hear the cogs of his brain working.

‘Are you … Did I see you yesterday?’

‘The cleaner. Yes.’

He ran a hand through his hair. ‘Ah. The whole door thing. I was just … having a tricky conversation.’

‘“Not now, thanks” tends to work just as well, I find.’

‘Right. Point taken.’ He leant on the bar. Jess tried to keep a straight face when his elbow slipped off. ‘So that’s an apology, is it?’

He peered at her blearily. ‘Sorry. I’m really, really, really sorry. Very sorry, O Bar Lady. Now can I have a drink?’

‘No. It’s gone eleven.’

‘Only because you kept me talking.’

‘I haven’t got time to sit here while you nurse another pint.’

‘Give me a shot, then. Come on. I need another drink. Give me a shot of vodka. Here. You can keep the change.’ He slammed a twenty on the bar. The impact reverberated through the rest of him so that his head whiplashed back slightly. ‘Just one. Actually, make it a double. It’ll take me all of two seconds to down it. One second.’

‘No. You’ve had enough.’

Des’s voice broke in from the kitchen. ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Jess, give him a drink.’

Jess stood for a moment, her jaw rigid, then turned and emptied the optic twice into a glass. She rang up the money, then silently placed his change on the bar. He downed the vodka, swallowing audibly as he put the glass down, and turned away, staggering slightly.

‘You forgot your change.’

‘Keep it.’

‘I don’t want it.’

‘Put it in your charity box, then.’

She gathered it up and shoved it at his hand. ‘Des’s charity of choice is the Des Harris Holiday In Memphis Fund,’ she said. ‘Really. Just take your money.’

He blinked at her, and took two unbalanced steps to the side as she opened the door for him. It was then she noticed what he had just pulled from his pocket. And the super-shiny Audi in the car park.

‘You’re not driving home.’

‘I’m fine.’ He batted away her protest. ‘There aren’t any cars around here at night anyway.’

‘You can’t drive.’

‘We’re in the middle of nowhere, in case you haven’t noticed.’ He gestured at the sky. ‘I’m miles away from everything, and stuck here, in the middle of fucking nowhere.’ He leant forward, and his breath was a blast of alcohol. ‘I’ll go very, very, slowly.’

He was so drunk that peeling the keys from his hand was embarrassingly easy. ‘No,’ she said, turning back to the bar. ‘I won’t be responsible for you having an accident as well as everything else. Go back inside, and I’ll call you a taxi.’

‘Give me my keys.’

‘No.’

‘You’re stealing my keys.’

‘I’m saving you from a driving ban.’ She held them aloft, and turned back towards the bar.

‘Oh, for Chrissakes,’ he said. He made it sound like she was the last in a long line of irritations. It made her want to kick him.

‘I’ll get you a taxi. Just – just sit there. I’ll give you your keys back once you’re safely inside it.’

She texted Liam from the phone in the back hall.

Does this mean I get lucky? he replied.

If you like them hairy. And male.

She walked back outside and Mr Nicholls was gone. His car was still there. She called him twice, wondering if he’d headed off to a bush to relieve himself, then glanced down and there he was, fast asleep on the outside bench. The angle of his limbs suggested he had simply keeled over sideways from his seated position and passed out.

She thought, briefly, about leaving him there. But it was chilly, and the sea mists were unpredictable, and he would likely wake up without his wallet.

‘I’m not taking that,’ Liam said, through the driver’s window, as his taxi pulled into the car park.

‘He’s fine. He’s just asleep. I can tell you where he’s got to go.’

‘Nuh-uh. Last sleeper I had woke up and vomited all down my new seat covers. Then somehow perked up enough to do a runner.’

‘He lives on Beachfront. He’s hardly going to do a runner.’ She glanced down at her watch. ‘Oh, come on, Liam. It’s late. I just want to get home.’

‘Then leave him. Sorry, Jess.’

‘Okay. How about I stay in the car while you drop him off? If he’s ill, I’ll clean it up. Then you can drop me home. He can pay.’ She picked up Mr Nicholls’s change from where he had dropped it on the ground beside the bench, and sifted through it. ‘Thirteen pounds should do it, yes?’

He pulled a face. ‘Ah, Jess. Don’t make it hard for me.’

‘Please, Liam.’ She smiled. She placed a hand on his arm. ‘Pretty please.’

He gazed down the road. ‘All right. But if he’s sick it’s thirty quid for the lost earnings. And you’ll have to clean it up.’

She lowered her head to Mr Nicholls’s sleeping face, then straightened and nodded. ‘He says that’s fine.’

Liam shook his head. The flirtatious air of earlier had evaporated.

‘Oh, come on, Liam. Help me get him in. I need to go home.’

He lay with his head on her lap, like a sick child. She didn’t know where to put her hands. She held them across the back of the rear seat, and spent the whole journey praying that he wouldn’t be sick. Every time he groaned, or shifted, she wound down a window, or leaned across to check his face. Don’t you dare, she told him silently. Just don’t you dare. They were two minutes from the holiday park when her phone buzzed. It was Belinda, her neighbour. She squinted at the illuminated screen: Boys have been after your Nicky again. Got him outside the chip shop. Nigel’s taken him to hospital.

A large cold weight landed on her chest. On my way she typed.

Nigel says he’ll stay with him till you’re there. I’ll stay here with Tanzie.

Thanks Belinda. I’ll be as quick as I can.

A drumbeat of anxiety began a tattoo in her chest. Mr Nicholls shifted and let out an elongated snore. She stared at him, at his expensive haircut and his too blue jeans, and was suddenly furious. She might have been home by now if it wasn’t for him. It would have been her walking the dog, not Nicky.

‘Here we are.’

Jess directed him to Mr Nicholls’s house, and they dragged him in between them, his arms slung over their shoulders, Jess’s knees buckling a little under his surprising weight. He stirred a little when they reached his front door, and she fumbled through his keys, trying to find the right one, before she decided it would be easier to use her own.

‘Where do you want him?’ said Liam, puffing.

‘Sofa. I’m not lugging him upstairs.’

‘He’s lucky we lugged him anywhere at all.’

She pushed him briskly into the recovery position. She took his glasses off, threw a nearby jacket over him, and dropped his keys on the side table that she had polished earlier that day.

And then she felt able to speak the words: ‘Liam, can you drop me at the hospital? Nicky’s had an accident.’

The car sped through the empty lanes in silence. Her mind was racing. She was afraid of what she might find. What had happened? How badly was he hurt? Had Tanzie seen any of it? And then, under the fear, the stupid, mundane stuff, like, Will I be hours at the hospital? A taxi from there would be at least fifteen pounds. Bugger Mr Nicholls and his stupid vodka.

‘You want me to wait?’ said Liam, when he pulled up at A&E.

‘Could you? I’ll only be two minutes. I just need to find out how bad it is.’

She was out of the door before he had even stopped the car.

He was in a side cubicle. When the nurse showed her in through the curtain, Nigel rose from his plastic chair, his kind, doughy face taut with anxiety. Nicky was turned away, his cheekbone covered with a dressing and the beginnings of a black eye leaking colour into the socket above it. A temporary bandage snaked its way around his hairline.