Until Proven Innocent

THREE

"Famous last words." Hugo gives Alma a wry smile, and then stands up. "I'm going."

"Of course you are." She watches Hugo take his car keys from the table and rake a hand through tousled hair, looking slightly dazed. Hugo's had so many one night stands he looks like he lives in the aftermath, with heavy lids and hair halfway settled and clothes always slightly wrinkled. "You've not changed one bit, Inglesby."

"You know," he says, a little hesitant, unsure whether or not he should give Morgan prior warning before re-introducing her to Alma. He concludes that Alma is not a person to give up, and would, inevitably, track Morgan down herself eventually, anyway. "Morgan is with Ray, tonight."

"She is?"

"She is."

"You better bring her back here with you, then."

Hugo bites his lip. "Jesus Christ," he mutters. "Morgan is never going to forgive me."

* * *

WHEN HUGO SEES her, buried in the midst of bodies sweating out alcohol, she's dancing with Willow Johnson, very girl-next-door, into saving the trees and veganism. They became friends, for some reason unfathomable to everybody else, when Willow knocked on Morgan's door raising money for a new town park. She'd been invited in for a drink, and, two or three glasses of red wine later, when Morgan put her sexuality to the test, turned down the offer of a date but instead gave Morgan something she perhaps needed more: a friend.

They've stayed that way ever since - longer than Hugo expected. Perhaps years of failed relationships have made him cynical, but he's been waiting for the car crash ever since the two stepped out of the acquaintance zone. Because with Morgan, there is always a car crash.

Alma is proof of that.

He threads his way through the writhing masses to meet them. Nearby, Ray is slumped against a wall, face just visible through a net of fingers. He always looks like this, after the buzz. Ray's limbs take all too kindly to alcohol but his mind does not, and by the time his muscles have slackened and his words are running themselves together, his drinking habit has his brain cornered.

"Hey," Hugo shouts, over the pounding of a song he's heard all-too-many-times, half an hour before unlocking the door to his flat and leading another hopeful inside, twelve hours before he watches them leave the same way they came. "How much has he had?"

"Ah, my favourite killjoy." Morgan ruffles Hugo's hair. "You're worse than the AA team leaders, babe."

This is Morgan Roux, full force. Hugo prefers her toned down, less callous, more of a Sunday morning than a Saturday night. He's seen Morgan bent over a canvas, paintbrush clenched between her teeth but lips still tweaked into a smile, blinds adjusted just-so and light softening everything that scares people off. Like this, though, she's smirks over shoulders and age-old spite, bitter and unrelenting, like the aftertaste of black coffee, double shot, no sugar. A perfect state, then, to meet her ex-girlfriend in.

"We have a problem," he shouts. "A big one. Help me get him back to the flat and I'll explain?"

"You try me, Hugo Inglesby." She steps away from Willow, anyway, planting her hands on her hips. "I swear to God, if it wasn't for you, I'd be forgetting a lot more of my problems on Saturday nights."

"You'd also be spending them in A&E," he points out, tilting his chin in Ray's direction. He's standing, just, on bent legs and sheer willpower. "Come on. If we're quick, we might make it back before the vodka makes its début."

"Where's the fun in that?"

"I ask myself the same question when I'm scrubbing sick out of my car seats." Hugo follows Morgan through the turbulence, her strides announced with the flashback of gold heels and a spit of 'move, wankers.' He and Willow advance more apologetically, with scuffles forward and hands pressed palm-up against their chests. Walking in Morgan's wake is a lot like walking through the zone of a natural disaster, yourself completely unharmed, while gaunt children raise blood-stained arms in greeting.