"Katy!"

"Oh, hey, Son…" She waited for her cousin to catch her up, pausing beside the fruit and veg stall and eyeing the produce. Now that she was in charge of the shopping, she figured that she should probably try and encourage the girls – and herself – to eat more healthily. "You alright?"

"D'you fancy coming round for dinner tonight?"

"Oh, sorry…" The blonde winced. "Can't tonight; I'm working."

"Oh, right… OK." Sonia smiled weakly. "Have you heard from Bex lately? It sounds like she's having a great time."

Katy nodded. "Yeah, she sent me a couple of photos the other day."

"Photos?" The expression on her face made her younger cousin pause.

Pulling out her mobile, she hunted through her camera roll until she found the photos of Bex on her travels. Handing them over to Sonia, she watched as the brunette looked at each for a while, before swiping onto the next. She recognised the expression on her face and felt sympathy sweeping over her.

"I can't do tonight, but fancy coming round for dinner tomorrow?" Katy offered. "Mum and Dad are both away at the moment, so I'll have all the kids and Tina might be there, but you're more than welcome to join us." She grinned. "It'll be nice to have some adult conversation for once."

"I thought you said Tina might be there?"

"Yeah, exactly."

Sonia laughed, although the expression in her eyes didn't change. She nodded slowly and promised to let Katy know the next day if she could make it. Katy privately thought that there was nothing to stop her cousin accepting the invitation, but let it go.

She shook her head as the young man on the fruit and veg stall asked if he could help her, before quickly heading away. Katy's mind was whirling with the many different situations that she needed to work through and she wasn't quite sure where to start. Making it to the bar and the relative safety of her office would be a bonus, but then again there would no doubt be people wanting to speak to her when she arrived and she really just wanted to concentrate on everything that needed sorting out.

"Not now, Alana!" She held up one hand in the barmaid's direction as the young woman stepped towards her the second she pushed through the door. Seeing her face fall, Katy sighed. "Give me half an hour, OK?"

As the brunette nodded, Katy let her eyes slip closed for a moment as she crossed the floor and began to ascend the staircase. Her mind immediately snapped back to where it had been before the interruption. Settling in her desk chair, she rested her elbows on the surface in front of her and put her head in her hands, thinking over the mediation meeting she'd been at that morning.

Tyler had been deliberately obstructive and she had risen to the bait. Katy winced as she remembered losing her temper, knowing that it would look bad when it was reviewed. She had the distinct impression that they weren't getting very far in their negotiations and wasn't quite sure what that meant for the future. Making up her mind to phone Ritchie and ask her, hoping that the woman would have some idea, she picked up her mobile.

'Can't get through to Jack. Have you spoken to him recently?'

Katy winced at the text from her father's girlfriend, wondering why he hadn't spoken to her. Jack had called the night before to speak to Amy and Ricky, although his answers to all of Katy's questions had been incredibly cagey and added to her suspicions that he wasn't where he'd said he was at all. Similarly, Ronnie had been just as vague about what she'd been doing when she'd called the evening before.

There was no doubt in Katy's mind that her parents were together, wherever they were. She had already decided that she was going to confront them when they got home, refusing to let them drag her into their lies. Nothing good could come of it – however much she wanted to believe that it would work out – and there was too much going on at the moment for Katy to be able to deal with the fallout of their affair. Besides, she didn't see why she should keep up her side of the deal she'd made with Ronnie if her mother was making no effort to do the same.

Wondering whether she was being selfish, Katy quickly typed out a message telling Denise the truth – that Jack had briefly called her brother and sister yesterday, letting her know that he'd said he'd been incredibly busy – and promising that she'd ask him to phone whenever he could. She felt bad for the older woman but thought that perhaps Denise knew, deep down, that something was going on.

"Tina!" Glancing and catching sight of the brunette up as she walked across the top bar, Katy beckoned her over. "You in tomorrow night or you got a hot date?"

Tina snorted. "Fat chance."

"Sonia might be coming over for dinner… I think she's missing Bex." Katy explained. "She invited me to hers tonight, but obviously I'm working, so I asked if she wanted to come over tomorrow. That's OK, ain't it?"

"Course… we're still mates."

"You sure?"

"Yeah. Besides, you don't have to ask me whether people can come for dinner at your house, especially if it's your cousin."

"You live there too." Katy reminded her. "It might be my house, but it's your home, T."

The brunette grinned at her for a moment, before pulling the younger woman into a tight hug. Katy smiled and returned it, giving her a final squeeze before disentangling herself and moving back behind the bar to finish restocking the fridge. Waving away Tina's thanks, Katy ordered herself to make herself useful, before shaking her head and carrying on with her task.

Straightening up from restocking the fridge in the lower bar a long while later, Katy was just rolling the kinks out of her neck and checking the levels of the bottles in the optics when she heard a low whistle from behind her and turned quickly. Seeing Isaac leaning in the doorway watching her, she rolled her eyes and smirked lightly, rounding the bar and leaning against it. Katy arched an eyebrow as he walked towards her, tilting her head as she appraised him carefully.

"What are you doing here?"

"Thought we could do lunch, if you're not busy?"

"Aren't you busy? Shouldn't you be serving the kids' lunches or something?"

"I'm not a dinner lady." Isaac laughed. "We do get lunch breaks."

"I thought you spent them running clubs or marking or something?" She reminded him, arching her eyebrow again.

"Usually, yeah, but I'm willing to spend my evening working instead if I can spend some time with you now. I know you're working later, anyway."

"You buying?"

"If I must." He teased her, before grinning and leaning in to kiss her. When she kissed him back, looping her arms around his neck, he pulled back to look at her suggestively. "Or we could just go back to yours."

Katy smirked. "I like that option better."