The Bedroom Assignment. Sophie Weston

know you’re not,’ her friend said candidly. ‘But there’s something about you.’

      ‘Pu-lease—’ said Zoe. She tried to joke but she was unnerved all the same.

      ‘There is,’ Suze insisted. ‘I’ve seen it, again and again.’ She rested her chin on her clasped knees, thoughtful. ‘At first I thought it was because you didn’t try as hard as the rest of us. I mean, your clothes were okay, but you always looked as if you’d scrambled into them at the last moment before going out. I said that to David once.’

      David was Suze’s boyfriend before last. Zoe had wondered several times whether Suze was as completely over him as she claimed to be. Now her voice changed and Zoe was certain.

      ‘And David said, “Yes, exactly.” That soft, rumpled look gave a man the feeling that you’d only got out of bed a few minutes ago. And that it wouldn’t take too much persuasion to get you back in again.’

      Zoe sat bolt upright, forgetting all about Suze’s possible broken heart. ‘He didn’t,’ she said, True Zoe taking over momentarily and genuinely appalled.

      ‘Yup.’

      ‘But that’s—so untrue.’

      ‘But effective,’ said Suze dryly.

      Zoe’s nails gouged into the grass. ‘It’s crazy. I—’

      Suze stopped hugging her knees.

      ‘Why did you really heave Simon?’ she said quietly. ‘The truth, now.’

      And that was the trouble, thought Zoe, scrabbling at a dandelion with real venom. Oh, she could tell Suze the truth, all right. It would only take one sentence. He wanted to go to bed with me and I bottled out. Only Suze would not believe her. And Zoe had no one to blame for that but herself.

      There was this big fable among their friends: Zoe Brown the femme fatale, and the men who never lasted. Only no one knew it was a fable. Not even Suze. And Suze thought she knew everything there was to know about Zoe Brown. She very nearly did, too. Just not—

      They had always told each other their secrets, from the time their mothers had walked them to kindergarten together. Suze was still telling. It was only Zoe who held back. And Suze had no idea.

      Of course Zoe did not lie. Well, not exactly. She had never stood up and actually told a falsehood about any of the men she had been out with. Only people made assumptions—the men themselves did nothing to deny them—and before she knew where she was the myth of Zoe the Butterfly Lover was born. Even her brother and sister thought she changed boyfriends so often because she got bored.

      Whereas the truth—

      Well, it could not go on. She had sworn it at New Year, looking in the mirror in Suze’s bedroom, the only stone cold sober person in the house. She had laughed and kissed poor, bewildered Alastair at miserable midnight. The smile had been plastered on her face so hard that she’d felt it would crack.

      That had been when she said to herself, No more. Everyone had been talking about their shiny new resolutions. Well, that was hers. Tell Suze first. Then the rest of the world. The truth. Then she could wave goodbye to Performance Zoe for ever. And get on with the rest of her life.

      Hello world, I’m a virgin.

      Only she never seemed to find the opportunity. The trouble was that there was such a huge difference between what she was and what everyone—all her friends, even her brother and sister—thought she was. Even a nice man like David thought she could be persuaded to get back into bed—back into bed—without too much difficulty. And then, just today, here was her best friend telling her ‘there’s more to relationships than sex’.

      Some of it was her own fault, Zoe knew. New Year was six months ago. There must have been chances to tell Suze. She had just run away from them. And, most damning of all, she had just unloaded her third escort of the year.

      She said slowly, ‘Okay. The truth it is. Simon’s a great guy. It wasn’t anything he did—’

      Suze laughed wickedly. ‘Okay. What was it that he didn’t do?’ And she leered with mock lasciviousness.

      At once Zoe was wincing internally. But outside she was laughing back.

      ‘Nothing to complain about. He made all the right moves. It wasn’t him, honestly. It was me.’

      ‘You don’t have to tell me that. It’s always you.’ Suze pursed her lips. ‘A complete split personality, that’s what you are.’

      ‘What?’ said Zoe, arrested.

      ‘If you ask me, you don’t know what you want. You unload a swinger like Alastair because he doesn’t want to play house with your barmy family. Then you hitch up with Simon who’s so domestic he comes with a matching Labrador. And he can’t keep you interested, either.’

      Zoe shifted. ‘It isn’t quite like that.’

      Suze was too intrigued by her own analysis to take any notice of Zoe’s uncomfortable murmur.

      ‘Don’t you see a pattern? You only want what you haven’t got at the moment.’

      Zoe’s heart sank. ‘Suze, listen to me—’ she began urgently.

      But there was ring from the little telephone clipped to Suze’s belt. She pressed a button and raised her eyebrows at the number displayed.

      ‘Jay Christopher? What does he want?’ She pressed another button and put the thing to her ear. ‘Hi, Jay. What can I do for you?’

      Zoe looked away across the garden. She could have kicked herself. Another ideal opportunity wasted. Again.

      What is wrong with me? thought Zoe, despairing.

      Meanwhile Suze had gone into crisp business mode. She even stood up to talk, prowling around the lawn as if she were patrolling her office. She snapped out questions like an interrogator, but most of the time she listened attentively.

      ‘So that’s more than a filing clerk,’ she was saying when Zoe tuned in again. ‘You need someone who can handle research. And work on their own initiative. And you want them by Monday. You don’t ask much, do you?’

      The telephone said something flattering.

      Suze laughed, undeceived. ‘And you know that nobody else would even think of trying. Okay, Jay, I’ll do what I can. But I need the paperwork tonight and I’m not in the office. If you’re serious about this, you’ll have to drop it off here.’ She spelled out Zoe’s address.

      The telephone said something else.

      ‘Am I an online map service?’ asked Suze sweetly. ‘Look in the A to Z. The good news is it doesn’t matter how late you get here. We’re having a party.’

      It was all the reminder that Zoe needed. She jumped to her feet. ‘Time to get on,’ she mouthed at Suze, and ran down the last set of steps to the patio and into the kitchen, command centre of Operation Party.

      She began to attack the remaining two thirds of the big refectory table with energy.

      Eventually Suze finished her phone call and followed. ‘Interesting,’ she said. She stood in the doorway, sucking her teeth. ‘Er—Zo? About your jobs next week…’

      ‘What?’ said Zoe, scrubbing hard.

      ‘I know you don’t want to sign on with me permanently. But—what about a one-off? Two weeks, maybe four. A really stimulating job, too. Lots of initiative required, and you get to use your brain, too.’

      Zoe knew her best friend well. Suze had not got to be a twenty-four-year-old phenomenon by focusing on the disadvantages of the employers who used her agency. ‘What’s wrong with it?’

      ‘Nothing. Honest. It’s a brilliant job.’

      ‘Then why haven’t you already