The Villa Read Online Free PDF

to know it all.
    ‘Maybe,’ Ben said, as if he could read her mind, ‘you and I should go out for drinks sometime.’
    Was he asking her out on a date? This gorgeous boy with hot lips who could make shimmering turquoise eyeliner look macho? Ginny tried to stay calm. But suddenly it felt like all the best things in the world – those jeans in Topshop that she couldn’t afford, chocolate biscuits from M&S, Kentucky Fried Chicken in a bun and cookie-dough ice cream (OK, mostly items of food, she realised that, but hey, that was her problem and she’d deal with it) had all happened in one fabulous wave at Hide Beach in full sunshine when she had no spots on her face, was wearing her zebra-print bikini and the Ball had disappeared behind a far-off goal line …
    ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Maybe we should.’
    He finished the jagged bit of her fringe. ‘Cool. Let’s exchange numbers.’
    ‘OK.’ Ginny watched as he fluffed it out with his fingers. ‘I’m having a party soon,’ she added. Her mother had only told her last night that she was going away. But how long did it take to plan a party? In this case about twenty seconds.
    ‘Will you be OK, Ginny?’ her mother had asked. ‘It’s only for a week. You’ll have Nonna and Pops down the road. And Lisa next door. You could stay at Nonna’s if you don’t want to be on your own.’
    Hovering unicorns. How old did she think Ginny was? Ten? She loved having the house to herself, though it didn’t happen often. Her problem would be that Nonna and Pops
were
down the road (although they were lovelyand Nonna was a great cook) and that Lisa
was
next door.
    ‘Who’re you going on holiday with?’ she asked her mother innocently.
    As intended, this brought on the guilt. ‘Oh, Ginny, I’d love to take you with me. Only you’re in the middle of revising for your exams and … ’
    ‘It’s OK.’ Ginny shrugged. ‘But I might have a few of the girls round one night. That’s all right, isn’t it? We’ll probably have pizza and watch a movie.’ If her mother knew she was having a gathering, then if it got out of hand, or
when
it got out of hand, or
if/when
any of her minders noticed that it had got out of hand, then everything would be far easier to explain. She firmly subdued the twinge of remorse that popped up whenever she deceived her mother. Ginny loved her, of course she did. And she knew how much her mother had done for her, what she had sacrificed, all that stuff. But she also wanted to punish her sometimes. Just for … Well, for nothing really. That was just the way things were.
    ‘Of course it is.’ Her mother looked vague. ‘Who …? ’
    ‘And who did you say you’re going with?’ Ginny cut in.
    ‘Oh, I’m not sure.’ Her mother looked evasive, which meant she was planning to go with Robin. ‘Maybe on my own.’ Which also meant she was planning to go with Robin. What a loser.
    For some reason which Ginny couldn’t quite fathom, her mother didn’t realise that Ginny knew about Robin. She’d been introduced to him, yes, when Lisa and her husbandMitch were also round, in that careful way her mother had, as if Ginny might say,
Who the fuck are you?
instead of,
Hello
, thus ruining her mother’s credibility for ever. Tempting though it was, Ginny had been polite and answered all his predictable questions about college and going to uni without so much as a
Jesus Christ
. She could almost hear her mother’s relief at his ‘What a sweet girl.’ Wanker.
    What her mother wasn’t aware of was that Ginny knew when Robin had been round in the afternoon. She knew when they’d gone to bed (Mum’s bedroom curtains drawn, two wine glasses in the room), and when they’d done it on the sofa (cushions plumped, coffee table at a different angle), though Ginny didn’t dwell on that one.
    She’d also worked out that he was married, since they didn’t hang out together at normal times and since her mother mostly looked unhappy or had pink spots on her