Chloe by Freya North

light out, she inched back the curtains. Carl, gloriously bare-chested, was waiting for her. She ran her tongue over her lips and could detect no roughness. Miracle. She whirled her tongue around her mouth and tasted something unfamiliar. Somebody else’s mouth. Somebody else’s desire. Desire. Unfamiliar. Delicious.
    Carl blew her a kiss; chaste laced with amorous intent. She cocked her head and smiled broadly. Closing the curtains as slowly as she could, she clambered into bed with a daft grin on her face. With a sigh, she closed her eyes immediately and welcomed the cushion of silence that preceded sleep. She had neither the time nor inclination to brush her hair and talk to the Andrews. In fact, she didn’t dare.

ELEVEN
    â€˜P eregrine, my true love, where
are
you?’ Jasper cupped his ear at the foot of the stairs and waited.
    â€˜Up here!’ came a faint reply.
    â€˜Up
where
exactly?’ yelled Jasper as patiently as he could.
    â€˜Up up up!’ sang Peregrine, ‘right at the top.’
    â€˜Oh God,’ said Jasper to himself, climbing the stairs with a heavy hand on the banister and a lighter one supporting his gammy hip, ‘not the damn frocks again.’
    To his relief, he found Peregrine safe in his corduroys handling a Coalport tea service with reverence. He brandished a dainty milk jug in welcome.
    â€˜Look what I found! Isn’t it divine! Wouldn’t First Flush Darjeeling taste incomparable in these darling cups?’
    â€˜First Flush Darjeeling,’ said Jasper as sternly as he could, ‘is indeed incomparable. It’s almost thirty pounds a pound!’
    Peregrine pouted most becomingly. ‘If we can’t have a little luxury – us, at our age and stage in life – then what! I may as well give up the ghost right now as face Typhoo
bags
in my dwindling days.’
    â€˜Don’t be such a drama queen,’ Jasper said. ‘You know I would rather drink no tea at all than drink anything other than FFD! Look here, look what we have!’ He waved an envelope in a gracious arc high above his head.
    â€˜Postmark?’ squealed Peregrine, clasping both hands tight around the sugar bowl.
    â€˜Guess!’
    â€˜Gwent?’
    â€˜Abso-blooming-lutely!’
    Sitting with perfect posture and an empty cup and saucer each, Jasper and Peregrine enjoyed Chloë’s letter. It seemed appropriate that as she had written from The Rafters, so they should be ensconced in Jocelyn’s attic aboard an old but deceptively supportive two-seater sofa covered with a dust-sheet. Envisaging Chloë huddled beneath her New Zealand rug, they pulled an old tartan blanket tightly about their knees and placed the china cups daintily on their laps.
    â€˜
Hullo you both
,’ Jasper trilled in falsetto. Peregrine took the letter from him and, placing pince-nez exactly where they should be, started to read.
    â€˜
Hope you’re happy and healthy
, bla bla,
weather cold but clear
, der der der, horse, bla bla. La la, up in The Rafters, cosy, private etcetera. Early nights ditto mornings. Bla bla. Work hard but have lots of fun. Don’t miss London, der der. No regrets, etcetera.
Miss you both
– us both –
madly
. Good! Etcetera.
Gin Trap a hoot
. Good Gracious Me!’ Peregrine fell silent while his eyes rampaged along the remaining paragraphs which ran to two pages.
    â€˜What?’ Jasper nudged him, alarmed that his eyes were so wide and that his jaw had dropped. It was either something utterly horrendous or gloriously disgraceful. ‘What what what?’ he piped, craning for a glimpse at the page and cursing his appalling eyesight.
    Peregrine folded the letter, put it back in the envelope before taking it out again and unfolding it slowly.
    â€˜Little Hussy!’ he proclaimed with unbridled pride.
    â€˜Ch
lo
ë?’
    â€˜The little tramp!’ Peregrine continued, delighted.
    â€˜What
has
she done?’