Becky shook her head. ‘Megan, I’ve thought about this a lot since I’ve been here.’ She stood tall, rolling her shoulders back, inching her chest out a little. ‘There have been many many occasions when I’ve taken a lot less than what I’ve been due for holiday. And there have been times – a lot of times – where I have worked many many more hours per week than is legally acceptable for someone to work. So, if there’s anyone who needs a lawyer then it’s you.’
Eek! She hadn’t meant to sound quite so confrontational. She did want to keep her job… at least until she had time to properly think through any alternatives. No one with half a brain put themselves out of employment without anywhere else to go. And maybe she didn’t want to go. She did love making the sandwiches… Why was Megan here now? When there were only a few days until she returned? Perhaps something else was wrong. Maybe it was Mum…
‘Is that so?’ Megan asked, a smirk appearing on her lips.
Oh God. It was the self-satisfied smile her sister always owned when she knew absolutely she was going to win an argument over pricing with the prawn man. Or perhaps it was simply bluff and bravado. Megan was quite good at that too. Becky would like to think that if it was something to do with their mum then Megan would have got to the point by now. So, it was a case of fold, or raise the stakes?
‘Yes,’ Becky found herself saying, stepping slightly closer to Megan, her pleather espadrille-covered feet making squelching noises from the sea water trapped in the hessian. ‘That is so.’ She took a breath. ‘I don’t need a lawyer to tell me I’ve more than given enough to It’s A Wrap over the years and you have absolutely no grounds to fire me.’
Megan linked her fingers together and almost triumphantly flexed them out. The sound of her sister’s knuckles cracking made Becky flinch.
‘Well,’ Megan stated as brusque as anyone could sound. ‘How about if I told you that Martin from the florist’s had an allergic reaction to the latest “creation” It’s A Wrap made him?’
‘What?’ Becky could hardly breathe now. Martin from the florist’s had an allergic reaction to something? Something she had made? Martin was usually a brie and bacon man. Had he opted for something else? Something from the range Megan knew nothing about? She was shaking, from head to foot, the Corfu sun doing nothing to raise her temperature from Alpine conditions…
‘He’s still alive. But it was touch and go for a while and—’
‘Oh my God!’ Becky exclaimed. ‘The reaction was that bad?!’ Poor Martin. Poor, poor Martin.
‘Yes!’ Megan shouted. ‘The reaction was that bad! And the very worst thing was… there was no label on the packaging! Nothing to tell anyone exactly what ingredients were in there!’
Becky couldn’t catch her breath. She had to phone Hazel and Shelley. She had to find out what they had given to Martin. Surely they wouldn’t have been stupid enough to give him a lunch meant for someone else… ‘I have to call Shelley… and Hazel.’ She was looking around for her bag. Where was it? Had she taken it off the boat?
‘Becky, take a second,’ Elias ordered, reaching for her hand.
‘I can’t take a second. I need to find… where’s my bag?’ She looked up into his face, those gorgeously bright eyes, those full lips… all the while she had been stepping outside of her comfort zone and finding herself, one of her customers had been nearly dying because of a sandwich. She couldn’t focus. Her eyes began to swim, her vision blurring.
‘I think… I think I need to sit down,’ Becky managed to say before she fainted on the floor.
Fifty-Five
Becky was quite sure ouzo wasn’t the best thing for someone who had fainted but, right now, it was the only thing hitting the spot in terms of her revival. Despite his protests, she had made Elias leave as soon as the olive trees stopped looking like they were tripling in number in her vision. Now on her second glass of the Greek spirit, with ice and a little water, she was making the most of the brief moments she had before she knew Megan would want to engage in battle again. And she didn’t blame her one bit. This was huge. This was terrible. Someone could have died because she had hidden part of the business from her sister. It didn’t get any worse than that.
‘You’re not pregnant, are you?’ Megan wanted to know.
Becky looked up out of the ouzo glass and observed her. She was tightly wound, like a dog who had been cooped up for days without a walk or, someone who hadn’t been able to leave the house between Christmas and New Year. Her drawn-on eyebrows looked tenser than the rest of her and the jumpsuit couldn’t possibly be perspiration-friendly. Surely even Megan would perspire in the Greek heat.
‘No,’ Becky replied. ‘Of course not.’
‘Good,’ Megan answered. ‘Because I don’t want anything stopping me from tearing strips off you for this, Becky.’
There was pure venom in her sister’s voice now. And Becky knew this went far deeper than Martin from the florist’s.
‘I’ll resign,’ Becky said immediately. ‘I’ll take all the blame and I will resign. Straightaway. Right now.’
‘You will not!’
‘I should!’
‘Yes!’ Megan agreed. ‘Yes, you should. Because I know everything, Becky.’
Becky had a vision of Hazel and Shelley being strung up in the cold room like the carcasses in the Maroon 5 video for ‘Animals’ – Megan a psychotic Adam Levine with a cleaver. It wouldn’t have taken much for either of them to start talking and Becky would never want nor expect them to suffer any duress keeping her secrets.
‘I know,’ Megan continued, actual, real perspiration beading on her lip, ‘that this crazy undercover enterprise of yours has been going on for over a year! That you have been selling all types of God-knows-what to my customers for over twelve months!’
It was eighteen months or more, and they were her customers too. But Becky wasn’t going to bring that up right now. ‘I have,’ she admitted, running a finger around the rim of her ouzo glass. ‘But I never, ever thought anything like this was going to happen.’
‘How could you not think that?! Are you an imbecile?! Have you not read or heard the news about labelling on food products? Pret A Manger, Becky! Pret A Manger!’
‘So,’ Becky began nervously. ‘This is just about the fact my products didn’t have detailed labels on them?’
‘Do we think that Martin from the florist’s would be in hospital right now if they had?’ Megan yelled. She was flailing her arms around now, mosquitos would be taking cover and so they should.
‘Well… you haven’t told me the circumstances of Martin’s allergy,’ Becky reminded. She was probably clutching at straws. Megan wouldn’t have flown to Corfu if she wasn’t absolutely sure this was all Becky’s fault. But what was Martin’s allergy? She was keen to know exactly what he had ingested that had landed him in hospital.
‘What circumstances do you need to know about?’ Megan hissed. ‘Do you want to know the part where his face went red? Or about when his lips swelled up? Or perhaps the bit where his boyfriend had to put him in a wheelbarrow to get him to the doctors because no one was answering at the surgery?’