The Chocolate Lovers' Club Read Free Page A

oes this mean that Crush won’t be coming home for Christmas?’ Autumn is wide-eyed with shock. But then Autumn is often wide-eyed with things.
    What would we all have to talk about, I wonder, if my love-life wasn’t such a disaster zone? I stare morosely at my cup. ‘I guess not.’
    Barely twenty-fours hours have passed since our last meeting and already I’ve had to text my best girls with a
CHOCOLATE EMERGENCY
. As always, they came running as fast as they could to my aid.
    It’s still effectively brunch, so Clive has served us with some warm, homemade
pain au chocolat
and some necessarily strong coffee. A selection of festive hits are playing on the stereo and, to be honest, I’d like to smash the speakers. Bing and his flipping ‘White Christmas’ is currently doing my head in. I’m not dreaming of a white Christmas, I’m dreaming of a very drunken one. And I’d like it to start as soon as possible.
    ‘Do you think Crush realised that it was you on the other end of the webcam?’ Nadia wants to know.
    ‘If he did, then he hasn’t tried to contact me.’ Which isa good job for Aiden ‘Bare-Bum’ Holby. There are approximately seven thousand swear words in the English language and I know virtually all of them. I would have shared that knowledge with him. Very loudly.
    ‘You’re not going to be alone over the holidays?’ Chantal asks.
    ‘No. No.’ I shake my head vehemently. ‘No, no, no.’ Actually, I am.
    The thing with expecting Aiden Holby to come home and sweep me into his arms beneath the mistletoe is that I’ve turned down all manner of exciting invitations simply to keep my time free to be with him. Well, I turned down an invitation from my dear mother to go to Spain to stay with her and her ageing, balding man, The Millionaire, and watch them cooing over each other like teenagers. Particularly horny teenagers. And one from my dad to go to the South Coast to spend my time watching him and his peroxide paramour, The Hairdresser, press themselves up against each other at inopportune moments. Frankly, with those choices I’d rather it was just me, bad telly and a family-size tin of Cadbury’s Roses. And it looks as if that’s exactly what I’m going to get.
    ‘Hey, maybe you could come over and have your Christmas lunch with me and Ted?’
    ‘I’ll be fine. Really.’ Chantal and Ted are still on very shaky ground after their recent acrimonious split. He wants kids – she doesn’t. She wants loads of sex – he doesn’t. Not sure how the possibility of procreation is going to fit in with that scenario – which is, I guess, the crux of the matter.
    Chantal, as a sort of empty revenge for her husband’s lack of libido, has been extensively continuing her sex-life with all comers. It’s led her into some very tricky situations, I can tell you. Frankly, Ted doesn’t know the half of it. He has no idea about Jacob The Male Escort or, even worse, Mr Smith The Gentleman Thief who had a one-night stand with our libidinous friend and then relieved her of thirty grand’s worth of jewellery. Who says that the sex-life of a married woman can’t be exciting, eh? Unfortunately, the only person it seems that Chantal
wasn’t
sleeping with was her dear husband. But that’s all in the past. Sort of. Now they’re trying to make a go of their relationship, but Ted is blowing very hot and cold. One minute he thinks that they can repair their marriage, the next he’s not answering Chantal’s calls. I’d imagine that when your husband has found out that you’ve been indiscriminately sleeping with all and sundry – including one of my boyfriends – it’s not going to be an easy wound to heal.
    Chantal is still living separately from Ted, but they’ve agreed to spend the time together over Christmas. Which has to be good, right? But I
so
don’t want to be a gooseberry in between those two. No way, Jose. Can you imagine it?
    ‘Are you going to see Addison over the holidays?’ Nadia asks