Page 19 of Tears of Glass

The one thing I can’t quite get over is Bowsley not letting go of my work. What difference does it make to them? Their house is full of priceless artefacts.

So, this basically means that right now, Elijah fucking Fairclough owns every single piece of work I’ve ever made – excluding those I did at Uni.

What an arsehole.

I squeeze my phone in my hands and my heart pounds. What a bloody ignoramus.

Without thinking, I search again through my contacts.

I may have deleted him from Facebook, but somewhere in my phone is his personal number.

Faith Hitchin: How dare you keep my pieces. Release them now.

To my absolute horror, three dots at the bottom of the screen show he’s typing back.

Eli Jones: No.

Well that’s damn rude.

I stand there. I don’t want to text back. I don’t want a conversation with the guy. Instead, as feet fall on the stairs coming closer to the living room, I send a message to Gerard. He may still be on my black/shit list of hell, but he’s not as far down it as Elijah.

Faith Hitchin: Can you talk to those weirdo Faircloughs and ask them to return my work?

Bollocks. I groan as my phone rings. I don’t actually want to talk to the guy.

“Hey.” I keep my tone sharp.

“How are you? How was the funeral?” Once, Gerard was my close friend, then I found out he was married, which was a problem as he’d failed to mention it before we slept together.

“It was fine.” I gloss over it. There was nothing fine with that day, nor with the way it ended. “I don’t understand why Bowsley Hall won’t give some of my stuff to Whitlocks. I’ve been with Whitlocks for a while, it’s not fair for them to be cut off.”

“I know.” I can hear his smirk down the phone. “I was the one who got you through the door.”

“Yes, yes.” I roll my eyes. Why is everything about ego? “So, what am I going to do? There is no way I’m talking to Jennifer Fairclough or any of them. You need to discuss this with them.”

“It’s not Jennifer, I don’t think. Though who knows what’s going on there at the moment.”

His words make my ears prick up. I hate myself for it, but there it is all the same. “What do you mean?”

“Just that Connie Fairclough has closed ranks. Even Peter who normally blabs about everything, is tight lipped at the moment.”

I mull on his words. What am I doing? I don’t give a shit about them. It must be to do with Tabitha and the scandal that’s about to befall them.

“Well, whatever. This sucks.”

“True.” He hesitates. “Faith, have you forgiven me yet for being a complete arse and not telling you I was married?”

“Ger, it’s not the point of having to forgive, it’s the fact you shouldn’t have done it.” I pause to light a cigarette. “I mean, hell, you could have told me and it might not have made any difference, but I don’t like secrets.”

“So what was it about Elijah? Why was he the one you changed everything for?”

Because I loved him.

The words almost slip out. “Don’t talk to me about him, okay?”

“Okay.” I hate the fact Gerard’s smug tone is singing down the line at me. He warned me about Elijah, and I ignored him. But then he did fuck me and fail to tell me he was married. So really, I don’t think either of them win on the moral front.

I drag on my smoke, sulking but not actually hanging up the phone which is what I should be doing.