My Perfect Stranger: A hilarious love story by the bestselling author of One Day in December. Kat French

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СКАЧАТЬ stuff, Honey settled for the supermarket’s own blend. Hal probably wouldn’t taste it anyway when he knocked it back without it touching the sides. He seemed to use it more for anaesthetic than pleasure. Picking up the bottle and screwing up her courage, Honey opened her front door, crossed the hallway and knocked tentatively on Hal’s door. Nothing. It didn’t surprise her.

      ‘Hal?’ she called his name lightly. Neighbourly. ‘Hal, it’s me. Honey.’

      He didn’t reply, and there were no sounds of life behind the stubbornly closed door, but he was in there, she was sure of it. It was pretty obvious from the way he’d practically begged for her tequila yesterday that he wasn’t planning on leaving the house anytime soon. Unease crept through Honey. Couldn’t the man just grunt or something, make some acknowledgment that he was alive at least? What if he’d drunk all the tequila and passed out cold? God, what if he’d hit his head?

      ‘Hal.’ She threw more power behind her voice, aiming for friendly, but immediately knew she’d failed and come over all officious and girl guide again. Glancing back towards her own open door, she sighed with resignation and leaned against the wall.

      ‘I’m not going away until you answer me, so you may as well make this easy on both of us, rock star.’

      Silence reigned, and Honey slid her weary bones down the wall to sit outside his door, the bottle of whisky beside her. ‘I’ll just sit out here then,’ she said, her elbows on her knees, chin cupped in her hands. ‘I guess I’ll just drink this whisky myself then,’ she said after a few minutes, not enjoying the manipulative nature of her comment but glad to be well and truly out of girl guide territory. And besides, it worked. Honey let out a long, slow breath of relief as the sound of movement on the other side of the door told her that he was at least alive.

      He was close to the door now, she could hear him breathing.

      ‘What will it take to make you give me that whisky?’ he grumbled.

      Honey raised her eyebrows, nodding philosophically into her hands. That was how it was going to be then.

      ‘Ah you know. Nothing much. A bit of neighbourly chat, maybe?’

      More movement from behind the door, and then his whisky and cigarettes voice again, only lower this time. Closer. As if he were sitting on the other side of the door.

      ‘I don’t chat.’

      ‘No?’ Honey said casually, not even sure why she was trying to engage him in conversation. She felt like someone trying to entice a kitten into their home with a saucer of milk. ‘Maybe you could just listen then, because I’ve had a pig of a day and I could do with offloading.’

      ‘So what, you thought you’d bribe your blind neighbour with whisky to make him listen? Don’t you have any friends?’

      Honey half smiled. Was it masochistic that she enjoyed his grouchiness? Glancing at her watch, she tapped the face with her fingertip. ‘Something like that. Ten minutes of your time and you get the whisky.’

      His exaggerated sigh was unmissable. ‘I’m not opening the door.’

      ‘Whatever. Just don’t go and do something else while I’m speaking.’

      His harsh laugh told her that her comment had struck a chord. ‘You mean I can’t go back to screwing the horny blonde in my bedroom? I could keep it quiet.’

      ‘In your dreams, rock star.’ Honey wrapped her arms around her knees. ‘So … I just had to tell two old ladies that they might be homeless soon.’

      A pause. ‘It’s not just my life you’re intent on screwing up then,’ Hal said.

      ‘It’s not my fault.’ Honey knew he didn’t care, but felt the need to make him understand anyway. ‘I manage the charity shop attached to the home they live in. They volunteer in the shop most days. They’re my friends, and I feel like shit.’

      ‘Did you tell me already why you’re making them homeless?’

      ‘I’m not the one making them homeless. The home is under threat of closure within six months because of lack of funds, the shop too. I’ll lose my job, and all of the residents will lose their homes. None of them are a day under eighty.’

      ‘Look on the bright side. They’re old. They might not make it through the next six months.’

      Honey sucked in a sharp breath, taken aback by his harshness. ‘You weren’t kidding when you said you don’t do chat, were you?’

      ‘If you were looking for Oprah you knocked the wrong door, sweetheart.’

      The term of endearment landed soft and hard at the same time. Hal had managed to deliver it with a heavy side order of sarcasm that stripped out any potential kindness. But something made Honey wonder how it would feel to hear him say it under different circumstances, in a different tone of voice.

      ‘Is it too soon to ask for that whisky?’ he asked into the lengthening silence following his last remark.

      Honey glanced at her watch. Three minutes. Seven to go. ‘Yup. Want to tell me about your day instead?’

      ‘Fuck off, Honeysuckle,’ he shot back, just as she’d expected that he would. Had she needled him on purpose? Potentially, and if she had it had backfired, because the way he’d said her name made it sound like … She let the pause extend this time.

      ‘Come on then, Mother Teresa. Tell me some more about this job you’re about to lose.’

      ‘It’s not so much my job I’m worried about. Well I am, obviously, but it’s Lucille and Mimi mostly, and all of the other residents.’ She paused and bit the inside of her lip. ‘They want me to spearhead a big campaign to fight the closure.’

      She thought she heard him half laugh. ‘I hope you’re photogenic for the newspapers. Will you wear your girl guide uniform?’

      ‘Do you have to be such a cock all the time? This is the most serious thing that’s ever happened to me.’

      She heard him sigh, deep and melancholy, and then the soft thud of something against the door, most probably his forehead as he leaned against it.

      ‘You don’t know how fucking lucky you are if this is the worst that life’s thrown at you, Honeysuckle.’

      His voice was close to her ear, and she let the side of her head tip against the door. Against his voice. If the door were to magically disappear, they’d have found themselves sitting shoulder to shoulder, his mouth against her hair.

      ‘Sorry. Didn’t mean to be insensitive,’ she whispered, feeling a fool and checking her watch and finding that they still had five minutes to fill.

      ‘You weren’t insensitive. I was being a cock. It’s kind of been my way since the accident.’

      It was the most genuine thing he’d said to her since she’d met him. ‘Want this whisky now?’

      ‘Does that mean our therapy session’s up?’

      The ghost of a smile tipped her lips. ‘I’ll let you have this one on the house, rock star.’

      ‘Does СКАЧАТЬ