Love Is a Four Letter Word Read Online Free PDF

sort of thing you fell into quite legitimately when you were a couple – along with soaping each other’s backs, mounding soapsuds into exaggerated body parts, and volunteering to have the end with the taps. Right on cue, the image of Patrick as she had last seen him appeared in her mind.
    She grabbed her loofah mitt and started scrubbing over-vigorously at her skin. Was this really supposed to have an effect on cellulite? Or did it just make you red and sore so that the cellulite was less noticeable? She peered at her thighs in the flickering light. As well as making it hard to see her cellulite, reason enoughsurely, the candles were in fact highly functional. Once activated by turning on the light, the extractor fan would continue its deranged mosquito whine for almost an hour even after the light had been turned off. Bella planned to get it fixed at some point, any day now almost certainly, once the damp had been done, but The List had reached such epic proportions that she felt unequal to the task of tackling even a single item on it, so for now she left the door open and the landing light on when she went to the loo – and she had baths by candlelight.
    She lay in the bath, lapped by the clean scent of lavender and the flicker of the candles. The events of the day whizzed around her mind, prosaic yet insistent. Was Seline annoyed with her? She should have asked Anthony about next week’s presentation. How long would the damp treatment take? And how messy would it be? She might even have to move out for a few days. If only someone else would come along and solve everything. Bella sank lower in the bath, soaked her flannel and draped it over her face. She closed her eyes and imagined she could see herself from above, wondering what it would be like to float up from her body, feel her mind, her thoughts detaching themselves, pulling at her flesh as they dragged away like a sticking plaster. Rain pattered hard against the window, fingers tapping a tattoo against the glass.
    She willed herself to hear his tread, the twisting of the doorknob.
    Behind her closed eyelids, she could see the candles in her mind, their flames sending skittering shadows on the walls, dancing patterns of light over her glistening thighs, her breasts. The door swings open and he looks at her questioningly. She smiles her assent and hecomes towards her and kneels down next to the bath. His flop of hair falls forward and he runs his hand through it to push it back. Silence. He does not need to speak, but his eyes gleam with longing. At first, he just looks at her, his gaze tracing her shape, then he pushes back his sleeves and reaches down to her—
    Downstairs, the phone rang and her answerphone clicked in.
    â€˜Hello. Dad again. Do you fancy coming for a visit at the weekend? Be lovely to see you. Mum says you’re welcome to bring anyone, you know. If you want to. If there’s someone. Well. Or just your good self of course. More than enough. Lots of love. Oh, and we’ve still got your house-warming present.’
    Bella rolled her eyes at an invisible audience. Still, she hadn’t visited the House of Fun for quite a while. She couldn’t fend it off for ever. The water was getting too cold, hovering at the same temperature as her skin so that she was hardly aware of it as water around her. Another minute or two and it would start to feel cool; she’d have to top up or get out. Out, Bella decided, or she’d look as alluring as a pickled walnut. It wasn’t too late to ring Dad back. Perhaps she would go; it might be fine. She could do with a change of scene anyway, have a walk with Dad and the dog, a break from staring at the still-packed boxes. She shivered and shook herself, automatically tapping each foot against the side to shed excess water, a relic from childhood baths and protecting the carpet. Do try not to drip absolutely everywhere, Bella-darling. If it gets wet, it’ll start to