Freya North 3-Book Collection: Cat, Fen, Pip. Freya North

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      STAGE 9

       Pau-Luchon. 196.5 kilometres

      Fen opened the door to her Kentish Town flat to find Pip clutching the Guardian and two cappuccinos in polystyrene cups. Pip had phoned not half an hour before and Fen had told her that she was working from home because she was desperate for no distraction. The fact that Fen was embroiled in a relationship with a colleague, as well as dithering over another man in Derbyshire, was distraction incarnate. Pip, who did not have a conventional job, never mind the choice of one man let alone two, assessed that if her sister was not physically at her place of work, or getting physical with a male, it meant she was at play and available for confabulation. The fact that Fen was visibly flummoxed, surrounded by papers and fluorescent Post-its, was of no relevance to Pip. She bustled in, removed the plastic lids from the coffee and licked each one clean. Fen, exasperated, motioned to her papers and files.

      ‘Very nice,’ said Pip, handing her sister a coffee, turning straight to Cat’s report on the procession down to Pau the previous day. ‘She’s very good, our baby sis,’ Pip murmured as Cat’s passion for the Tour filtered through the newsprint and infused the reader.

      ‘I’m dying to know what’s happening,’ Fen said, now enjoying the cappuccino and grateful for her sister’s intrusion.

      ‘Me too,’ Pip enthused. ‘Both Cat and that nice Paul Sherwen chap from Channel 4 say that the race starts in earnest now, in the mountains, that the challenge for the yellow jersey will be at its most intense and consequential.’

      Fen stared at Pip. ‘All that – yes,’ she said, ‘and Fabian Ducasse is a spunk and a half, but I was referring to Cat – and the doc. Where do you think they’re at?’

      ‘Oh blimey, of course,’ Pip said, sitting cross-legged at her sister’s feet, ‘brawny Ben.’

      ‘Shall we phone her?’ Fen suggested, already dialling. Pip grabbed the phone from her, scooping cappuccino froth from the side of the cup with her index finger while waiting for Cat to answer.

      ‘Hullo?’ said Cat, sounding like she was just around the corner, sounding like she had just woken up.

      ‘Have you shagged him yet?’ Pip all but squealed.

      Though she really shouldn’t have been startled by her sister’s trademark bluntness, Cat found herself answering with an affirmative giggle. While she listened to her sisters shrieking with delight in the background, Cat considered that, though she had indeed shagged Ben, that they had quite categorically fucked each other’s brains out, gorged on each other to satisfy a very base hunger, there had been an edge to it all. Right from the start. Sexual desire, yes, but something else, something more too. Merely confirming that she had shagged the man did both him and herself something of a disservice. It had been more than just sex, but what, exactly? Surely the sex could not have been so good without this enhancing extra layer of something or other? Physical attraction is one thing on but one level; to be mutually attracted to each other is something else and multi-faceted. And somewhat perplexing.

      ‘He’s lovely,’ Cat said to Pip’s ‘Come on come on come on!’

      ‘What was it like?’ Fen asked excitedly. ‘Was he good?’

      ‘It was great,’ Cat replied.

      ‘Where did you do it?’ Pip butted in. ‘When? How many times?’

      ‘I like him,’ Cat reiterated, thinking, deluded, that she was being discreetly noncommittal, ‘it was great.’

      And then Cat changed the subject. СКАЧАТЬ