Chapter Thirty Four

Lee squinted in the daylight as he slowly opened his eyes, frowning when he realised that Chloe was no longer in his arms. He sat up slowly, frowning further when he saw that she was asleep on his section of the sofa. He quickly stood up and walked into the kitchen, racking his brain to try and figure out what had happened last night. He remembered spending a magical evening with her, just the two of them and he remembered holding her close as he fell asleep.... but after that nothing...he also had no recollection of Matt coming home and why he was asleep on an air bed on the floor.

As soon as Lee made himself a coffee, he quickly returned to the living room, sitting beside Chloe carefully so as not to wake her. She glanced up at him, gently placing her head on his lap and snuggling against him.

"Did something happen last night?" he asked her, taking a sip of his coffee. He frowned to himself when she ignored him, smiling slightly when he realised that she'd fallen asleep again.

Lee smiled at Louise and Kirstie as they walked into the room, still dressed in their pyjamas.

"Ugh, I'm so hungover." Louise sighed as she sat on the sofa. Kirstie smiled at her as she sat beside her.

"Yeah well, you did get a bit carried away didn't you." Kirstie smiled.

"I know, it was awful." Louise agreed.

"That guy you were dancing with seemed nice though and he seemed really into you." Kirstie pointed out.

"What was his name again?" she added.

"Peter." Louise said, her cheeks colouring slightly.

"He gave me his number too." she added, smiling slightly as she felt her heart flutter.

"Awesome, that's really exciting!" Kirstie said, clapping her hands happily.

"And I woke up to a text from him this morning, so now I don't know what to do." Louise told them. Before Kirstie could stop herself, she let out a squeal of excitement, causing Chloe to jump and open her eyes. She blinked slowly for a moment, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

"Sorry Chloe." Kirstie said quickly as Chloe slowly sat up.

"It's fine." she mumbled, still not fully awake.

"Are you tired?" Lee asked her, gently brushing her hair out of her face. Chloe nodded slowly, smiling at him as he handed her his coffee.

"You look like you need it more than I do." he told her.

"That's because you slept like a baby." Chloe sighed, quickly taking a sip of his coffee.

"Yeah, you were out for the count." Kirstie laughed.

"Didn't you hear us come back at all?" Louise asked. Lee shook his head, glancing at Chloe for a moment as he finally made the connection in his head. The reason she wasn't in his arms when he woke up must have been because she was trying not to let the others know about them. Chloe quickly rummaged in the bag at her feet and pulled out her hairbrush, quickly running it through her hair as she suddenly felt self-conscious.

"Anyway, tell me about last night, what did I miss?" Chloe asked when she sat back against the sofa beside Lee.

"Well Louise was just telling us that her mystery man from last night has sent her a text this morning." Kirstie said, wiggling her eyebrows at Louise.

"Ooh, what are you going to do?" Chloe asked her, taking another sip of coffee.

"I don't know." Louise admitted.

"I think I need to meet this guy first, to check out his intentions." Lee piped up. Louise rolled her eyes as both Chloe and Kirstie turned to face Lee, frowning in confusion at him.

"I didn't realise the two of you were close." Kirstie frowned, looking between the two of them.

"We just see each other at work a lot." Louise said.

"I think we kind of bonded over missing you." Lee said thoughtfully, gently stroking Chloe's hair.

"And I felt really guilty that you left because of me and Louise was missing you. I wanted to try and make up for it." Lee explained. Chloe smiled at him, her heart swelling with pride that he cared about her friend enough to want to protect her from being hurt. She glanced down at his lips, desperately wishing that she could kiss him, quickly turning away from him before she was unable to resist any longer.

Chloe felt her heart plummet as Michelle walked into the room and sat on the sofa beside Kirstie. Kirstie frowned at her when she realised that she had a bottle of vodka in her hand.

"Speaking of men, where did you disappear to for like an hour last night?" Kirstie rounded on Michelle as soon as she sat down.

"I don't know what you are talking about." Michelle said quickly.

"You definitely disappeared, and you were grinning like a Cheshire cat when you came back, so spill." Louise laughed.

"And you disappeared more than once too." Kirstie insisted. Michelle rolled her eyes and remained silent, not really in the mood for being teased. Ben smiled at them as he walked into the living room.

"Fry up for everyone?" he offered, smiling when everyone nodded. He winked at Kirstie and quickly walked into the kitchen.

"It sounds like you all had a really nice time." Chloe smiled at them.

"It would have been better if you were there though." Louise smiled at her.

"It's probably a good job you didn't go though." Kirstie said quickly.

"Why?" Chloe frowned, glancing at Matt as he let out a loud snore.

"Shayne was there." Kirstie announced, screwing up her face in disgust.

"The slime ball himself." Louise agreed. As soon as he'd heard Shayne's name, Lee impulsively wrapped his arm around Chloe's shoulders, to make sure that she was protected and felt safe.

"It's okay." Lee whispered in Chloe's ear, when he felt her becoming tense as she thought about Shayne.

"He wouldn't dare touch her anyway, because I'd kill him." Lee said quickly, his tone slightly fierce.

"He didn't give any of you any trouble, did he?" Lee quickly added, glancing at Chloe as she reached up towards his arm that was still around her shoulder and carefully took his hand.

"No, we didn't speak to him." Kirstie said quietly.

"He was probably busy spending the whole evening trying to take advantage of drunk women." Lee muttered bitterly.

"He didn't actually, he spent most of the evening with me." Michelle piped up. The four of them turned to face her, staring at her in shock as they tried to process her words.

"Are you serious?!" Kirstie exclaimed.

Michelle nodded slowly.

"Even when you know what he's like?" Kirstie asked.

"I'm not entirely sure I believe that to be honest." Michelle said.

"He told me that it all got exaggerated and twisted to make it look like he was the one in the wrong." she added.

"Well, he's not going to say anything else is he." Louise said, rolling her eyes.

"I believe him, it's not like there are any witnesses, and it's very much an accusation of he might have tried to rape me, rather than he actually did." Michelle pointed out.

"So, you don't think that trying to undress someone on a dancefloor is wrong then?" Lee asked, trying to keep his tone level.

"No, not really, it's not exactly rape is it." Michelle said, rolling her eyes.

"And when Chloe ran away from him into the bathroom and he tried to follow her?" Lee asked, demanding her to try and justify Shayne's behaviour.

"Was she running away, or did she want him to chase after her?" Michelle pointed out.

"That's what he told me." she added taking a swig of vodka.

"Why would I make something like that up?" Chloe frowned, feeling slightly hurt that her so called friend thought she was capable of something like that.

"Because you like pretending to everyone that you are Little Miss Perfect and it's exhausting!" Michelle exclaimed.

"You need to shut your mouth." Lee warned her angrily.

"I don't know why everyone else seems to fall for it, when the truth is, you're an attention whore who likes to have everyone fawning over you." Michelle continued.

"You're one to use the word whore, given that you'd spread your legs for anyone." Lee said quickly, glancing down at Chloe when he heard her sniff.

"Oh look, here come the tears, just because you don't have any parents, doesn't mean you need to try and get attention from other people all the time." Michelle sighed, rolling her eyes. Lee quickly stood up, angrily walking towards Michelle.

"Lee don't!" Chloe said quickly.

"BEN!" Kirstie yelled, desperately hoping that Ben would hear them from the kitchen. Lee stood in front of Michelle, slowly clenching and unclenching his fists, trying to get control of his temper as she sat smirking up at him.

"Lee, stop, you'll never forgive yourself." Chloe called out to him, slightly afraid of what he was going to do. Ben rushed through from the kitchen, quickly assessing the situation. He quickly pushed his way between Michelle and Lee, placing his hand on Lee's chest and moving him backwards.

"Oh Ben, thank god." Michelle squeaked from behind him.

Lee scoffed, shaking his head angrily as he heard Michelle pretending to be the victim.

"Michelle stop, you're the cause of this!" Kirstie told her sharply.

"You need to go and cool off." Ben told Lee quickly, when he could see him steadily becoming angrier by the minute.

"Come on, we'll go and see Danny." Chloe suggested, taking hold of Lee's hand, in a desperate attempt to calm him down.

"Louise, could you grab the leftover pizza from the kitchen please?" Chloe asked, afraid to leave Lee's side in case he lost control and lashed out.

"Lee please, she's not worth it." Chloe said quietly, when Lee still hadn't torn his eyes away from Michelle. After a few moments of silence, Lee took a deep breath and nodded slowly, eventually turning to face Chloe. Louise smiled as she handed Chloe a sandwich bag with the leftover pizza inside.

"Thank you." Chloe said quietly. Chloe rummaged in Lee's suitcase and handed him his jacket, before quickly pulling on her own and placing the pizza safely in her pocket. She quickly picked up their phones and put them in her pocket.

"Lee, let's go." she said quietly when he hesitated for a moment. Lee sighed for a moment before walking out of the front door, slamming it behind himself. Kirstie smiled at Chloe as she mouthed sorry at her on the way past.

"Thank you so much Ben." Michelle whispered as soon as Lee and Chloe had left.

"Cut it out, you caused the problem, so don't play the bloody victim!" Kirstie said angrily.

"Are you guys talking about Shayne?" Matt piped up. They turned to face him, not realising that he was awake. Kirstie nodded slowly, still not quite able to believe that Michelle had been so cruel to Chloe.

"The guy has form, after I fired him from the label, a couple of other staff members came to me and told me that he'd behaved inappropriately with them too." Matt told them.

"Oh whatever, you're all under Little Miss Perfect's spell anyway, I don't know why I bother." Michelle snapped, before standing up and quickly leaving the room. Louise, Kirstie, Ben and Matt fell silent, the four of them still confused as to what had caused Michelle's outburst and why she hated Chloe so much. They jumped as they heard the smoke alarm ringing loudly.

"Oh shit, the food!" Ben exclaimed, before quickly running into the kitchen.