Remix. Part 8

"Some of us need vetoes!" Anna shouts and I see her glance at Kaz. "No way am I prepared to snog your ugly mug, Dongle."

"And I'm not kissing any guys," Travis adds, getting a well-deserved eye roll from the rest of us. "What? I'm not gay."

"Shut up, Travis," Stu says, blowing out a stream of smoke. "Or I'll kiss that disgust right off your pretty little face."

There's a lot of laughter and a couple of good-natured threats thrown back and forth before Anna brings the conversation back round to the vetoes.

"Anyone not prepared to pucker up drinks a shot of tequila instead," Anna says.

Kaz shakes her head too violently, which only attracts unwanted attention.

KAZ.

"Who is it you're so keen to avoid kissing, Kaz? It can't possibly be the boy next to you," Stu says, loud enough that everyone turns to stare at me as I'm consumed by flames of embarra.s.sment. I can't even bear to look at Tom.

"It's you she doesn't want to kiss, a.s.shat." These are the first words Ruby's said to him since she arrived.

"And what about you, Ruby?" Stu says in a low voice that everyone can hear.

Ruby shrugs. "Nothing I haven't done before."

Dongle and Parvati exchange a glance. There's none of the surprise that Anna displayed they knew the score before they suggested the game. For a moment I feel like bashing their heads together.

If Owen or Lee were here, that's exactly what would happen.

RUBY.

It's Stella who's sitting pressed up a little too close to the other side of Stu who spins the bottle first.

Goz.

Their kiss isn't anything too racy, and when it's Goz's turn, it lands on Parvati, who groans, but still goes for a snog over a shot. When she spins the bottle, it lands on Tequila Girl No. 2 and the pair of them shrug and go for it to cheers from the boys.

"Grow up." Parvati rolls her eyes at Dongle.

I lose interest in all the to-ing and fro-ing, concentrating instead on knocking back the beer in my hand and then going for a tequila rather than reaching across to the cool box behind Stu.

My attention snaps back to the game when the bottle knocks against my foot. It was Dongle's spin and the neck end is pointing at Stu. His groan is cut short as Dongle dives on him and they roll around on the floor with Dongle making kissing noises that we can all hear because his face is about a foot away from Stu's.

Stu's laughing when he's released and the sight of him squeezes at my insides.

I require more tequila.

KAZ.

Ruby looks thunderous as she tips her head back to drain her cup before pouring another slug of tequila into it. I try and tot up how much she must have drunk today.

"s.h.i.t." Both Anna and Tom have gone very still on either side of me.

"What?"

Neither of them say a word and I follow their gaze to the bottle that's sitting on the rug in front of Stu. Pointing at Ruby.

RUBY.

"What you waiting for?" Stu smiles across the circle at me. "Nothing we haven't done before, right?"

My words in his mouth, mocking me.

b.o.l.l.o.c.ks. If I hadn't talked it up I could have just taken the shot.

No going back now.

Not that I want to. Every muscle in my body is clenched tight with excitement at the thought of kissing him. I can remember the way it feels ... the way it tastes...

No way in h.e.l.l will I admit to it though.

I shrug. "Whatever."

It only takes seconds for him to crawl the distance from one side of the circle to the other, his eyes on mine, but time seems to slow, the same way that the noise fades and the people around cease to matter.

My pulse starts thrumming in my throat and I swallow, the last few drinks loosening my grip on reality.

When he's right in front of me, I can't escape the look in his eyes, as if he can see my memories of everything we've done together playing on my retinas like a film reel. His clothes are infused with the warm smell of weed and wood smoke. I breathe in a short, shallow breath and taste the memory of sun on his skin and the beer on his breath.

"Come here, then," Stu says in a low voice, a murmur that no one but me can hear. That no one but me has heard before. He raises a hand to my jaw, his fingers brushing my hair back off my face and behind my ear as he brings his face to mine, his nose brushing my cheek and I don't mean for my lips to part, but...

I can't do this.

KAZ.

No one seems to know what happened. One minute Stu's about to kiss her, the next Ruby's leaped up and away from him, downing her drink so fast it spills across her cheek. Wiping her face with the heel of her hand, she kicks the bottle across the circle to where Stu's sitting back on his heels.

"Spin it again."

And she's gone, fast, unsteady steps on legs that look thin and cold and white in the dark night. When I look over at Stu, all he does is shrug. It's only as I'm running after her, following a rushed goodbye to Tom and a hop and skip over the guy ropes blocking my path, that I realize that Stu might have looked like he couldn't care less, but it's the first time he hasn't been smiling about something.

Good.

10 * BIGMOUTH STRIKES AGAIN

RUBY.

"Ruby!"

I can't even identify the emotions that are flooding through me at the sound of my name.

"Ruby wait!"

All I do know is that the person calling me is Kaz not Stu and she's not the one I'm running from. Within seconds, Kaz has caught up with me and I feel her arms round me, pulling me in for a hug that's more rea.s.suring for her than it is for me.

"Are you OK?"

"No. I'm not OK." I glare at her, too angry with what's just happened for it not to spill out into everything I see or hear or touch. "What the f.u.c.k was Stu doing there?"

"I don't know." Kaz looks pained. "I'm sorry, Ruby." Actually, Kaz doesn't look so much pained as guilty. "G.o.d, this is all my fault." She almost whispers it, then, louder, she says, "I saw Stu earlier and-"

"You what?" I explode, my brain barely managing to process the words. "And you didn't think to mention it?"

"I did, but-"

"You thought lying was a better idea?"

"No! It's not like that. I thought maybe you wouldn't want to know."

This is the second time Kaz has decided what is and isn't good for me when it comes to the truth about Stu. At least last time she was doing the right thing. This time though... "You thought it would be better if I was totally punked by Stu turning up at my campsite instead?"

"That wasn't supposed to happen. Owen said-"

"Owen?"

KAZ.

I hadn't meant to throw Owen under the bus (had I?), but it's too late to cover that up as well.

"I asked Owen what I should do. He said not to tell you." Oh G.o.d, I have made that sound so much worse for him than for me.

"So what? Owen is my brother's boyfriend he's not my best mate. Owen can keep whatever secrets he likes from me. I didn't think you and I were meant to have any at all, but this weekend you've been stacking them up like a set of p.i.s.s Ruby Off Top Trumps. What part of 'we don't do secrets' was so f.u.c.king hard to grasp?"

"I said I'm sorry." Tears rise up behind my eyes and I blink them back down. I hate that I cry so easily. I hate that it's Ruby making me want to. "I was trying to protect you. I didn't think we'd run into him again. If I'd been there when Dongle called Travis, I'd have stopped him."

"And where were you?" The way Ruby's looking at me turns me inside out, as if my mind is a sheet of music and she's reading every note.

"I was getting chips with Tom."

"Of course you were. And when you were getting chips with Tom, did you by any chance ask about his girlfriend?"

"I don't need to, Ruby. Tom would tell me. It's not like with you and Stu. We're friends."