daunt

fifty eight

calum lit himself a cigarette and watched sierra come through the doorframe, slumping down beside him on mali's sofa.

"a'ight?" calum mumbled, offering her a ciagrette, to which she shook her head.

"i'm not staying long," mali hurriedly said, popping a small mirror from her handbag out and checking her hair and makeup before turning her body to look at calum, straight on. "i know how to sort out your sister and get her thinking straight again." she smiled.

calum took the cigarette from between his lips and blew the smoke out the side. "you do?" he asked, looking at her with interest in his eyes.

"yeah." mali's eyes flickered down for no longer than a second before they were trained on calum again. "listen, what i said about ashton, it was a bit of a mix up. he's really sorry and upset about what he did and he wants to talk to you again. it's all luke's fault, not his, in fact, he didn't play any roll in this at all." sierra swore on her heart. she fought back the smirk that threatened to dance on her lips. if luke had agreed to help me, maybe i wouldn't throw him in the deep-end of this whole thing. "i actually spoke to him yesterday, and we've cleared the air and agreed to be, not 'friends', but certainly not enemies."

calum nodded, finishing his cancer stick. "i'll talk to him later then and apologise, i guess. i feel kinda stupid now. what about mali?"

"mali will be fine. don't worry about her. leave that to me." she smiled sweetly, too sweetly, and got up from the sofa, leaving through the same door she came in through.