Armani Angels by Cate Kendall Page A

them, which was now apparently coming more from her side than from his.
    â€˜Oh, luv, that’s right bad, that is.’ Chantelle looked at her in sympathy.
    The waiter, observing their empty flutes, headed over to take their order. Mercedes spied his approach and stood hurriedly. ‘Off to the loo,’ she announced. She grabbed her bag and disappeared.
    Gemma made sure Mercedes was out of earshot then turned with a grin to her friend. ‘Now, my little pixie, about the book launch the other night, we haven’t talked yet. How could you do that to Mercedes?’
    â€˜Wha . . . ?’ Chantelle asked, laden with wide-eyed innocence.
    â€˜Why on earth would you send her along to that funny little lady’s book launch? There is no way IQPR would have been represented there.’
    Chantelle let go of her faux ‘not me’ act.
    â€˜Oh, Lord, she deserves it, Gem; she’s totally using you. She couldn’t get invited to her own mother’s birthday party without you bringing her along. It was just a bit of a laugh.’
    Gemma tsked and shook her head at her friend. ‘It was mean. You’re a minx.’
    They watched the waiter top up their glasses with the freshly opened bottle. He placed the white napkin over the wine cooler and left them to it.
    â€˜Cheers,’ Gemma said, raising her glass. ‘Here’s to friendship.’
    â€˜Hear, hear.’ Chantelle clinked her glass against Gemma’s. ‘Genuine friendship.’

The stripes of sun that forced their way through the timber blinds cut through Gemma’s skull. She groaned. Whoever started the rumour that you can’t get a hangover from drinking French fizzy was a freaking liar.
    She peeped through gunky eyelashes to the other side of the bed. Excellent, he wasn’t there. She breathed out deeply. She could relax. Gemma loved having the bed to herself. She starfished happily.
    Propping herself up onto one elbow, Gemma drained the bottle of water that her wise drunk self had left for hung-over self to discover in the morning. Oh, good old drunk self, you’re not all bad, she thought.
    She sprawled back across the bed to wait for the parched cells throughout her body to rehydrate and make her feel a little more human.
    It was wonderful to have the bed to herself; nowadays she preferred to wait till Stephen was asleep at night before she slipped in beside him, careful to avoid contact between their bodies. She rubbed her aching eyes and sighed. It hadn’t always been this way. When they’d first fallen in love, they couldn’t get enough of each other, making love at all times of the day. Then they’d had Tyler – far too young and before they were ready. He’d been a difficult baby who screamed with colic pains for the first year of his life and went on to be a restless sleeper who rarely settled for more than an hour at a time. Gemma had taken to sleeping on a mattress on his floor, then finally moved a single bed into his room, so she could sleep better, and somehow four years went past before she ventured back to the marital bed. By then a distance had grown between her and Stephen.
    He resented her all-consuming concern for Tyler, accused her of coddling the boy. Gemma was angry that she always had to comfort the sleepless child, despite the fact that she was working hard to finish her degree at night, while being a mum all day. She remembered yelling at Stephen with frustration and him yelling back that someone had to earn the money, that he’d love the luxury of time to study.
    She padded to the bathroom for some more water, thinking about her marriage. She knew that each of them had been at fault for letting a coldness creep between them, but it seemed to have happened so gradually that neither noticed or seemed to have the energy to deal with it.
    They’d had lots of good times, of course – Tyler’s birthday parties, Christmases and