LITMIR.BIZ

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door closed smoothly with an airy sigh as the driver pulled out from the hotel and veered around one of dozens of yellow taxis weaving through the bicycles thronging the broad road.

      ‘I hope we can go shopping here later,’ Maggie remarked as they roared past market stalls set out under spreading shade trees on the pavements.

      At a street corner a group of elderly men squatted around a card game. The woman sitting beside Joshua Tagget stood up, put a camera to her eye, and leaned across him to take a picture of them. Her colourful low-necked sunfrock must have allowed him an enjoyable view of a fairly spectacular cleavage.

      Cat, Felicia scolded herself. She’d long since given up wishing for a more generous endowment in that department, or for shiny black hair and sea-green eyes, a smaller nose and larger hips.

      She didn’t regret having had her over-prominent teeth straightened, even though it had meant two years with a mouthful of metal, and by now she knew that the long legs that had made her gawky and self-consciously taller than her classmates at twelve were an asset rather than a liability. The figure she’d finally developed as a late-blooming teenager was adequate if not sensational, the envy of many of her friends who constantly battled with their weight.

      She’d dyed her hair once and it made her look like something out of The Munsters. These days she contented herself with an occasional strawberry rinse to give it extra life in winter. Some people professed to find her emphatically blue eyes beautiful, and she used eye-shadow sparingly to intensify their colour, as well as mascara to darken and lengthen her lashes.

      The engine throbbed warningly and Joshua’s seat companion sat down again as they shot off round the corner, the driver blasting his horn with little visible effect on the massed cyclists.

      Maggie put a hand to her chest and inhaled sharply as the bus narrowly missed an oblivious rider pulling a cart piled high with woven baskets. But she soon recovered.

      ‘Oh, look!’ she said, pointing. A teenage girl in a bright red regional costume stood hawking embroidered goods outside a building that combined twentieth-century business architecture with the distinctive curved roof lines of the Orient.

      Felicia was grateful for the novelty of the passing scene, and the need to respond to Maggie’s excited comments. She couldn’t push Joshua Tagget entirely out of her mind, but at least he could be relegated to the fringes.

      Eventually they drew up outside the looming pink wall of the Forbidden City. Emerging into blinding sun, Felicia put on dark glasses and the wide-brimmed hat she’d been advised to bring. She’d used sunscreen before leaving the hotel, and dropped the tube into her bag. She hoped the brunette now standing alongside Joshua while the guide waited for the rest of the party to alight had done the same. The woman had very fair skin, contrasting with Joshua’s tan. They made a striking couple.

      Pain twisted inside Felicia, translating into anger as fierce as it was illogical. She could hardly expect the man to spend the rest of his life mourning the events of twelve years ago. But, she thought bitterly, watching the sunlight catch the surprising russet lights in the darkness of his hair as he bent his head and smiled at the woman beside him, he needn’t look so damned untouched, so impervious.

      As if he’d felt the intensity of her gaze, he turned his head in her direction, and she hastily looked away, following the guide through the Tiananmen Gate, opposite the vast, famous square.

      In the enormous cobbled courtyards, black-clad gardeners were painstakingly removing weeds and grass in the continuing work of restoration. As the tour party crossed the baking hot stones Felicia mentally clothed the crowds of Chinese sightseers in the sumptuous, graceful fashion of the courtiers and servants who had once lived and worked here.

      Leaning on the barrier at the doorway of The Palace of Heavenly Purity to photograph a wonderful dragon screen behind the high throne, she found herself standing next to Joshua Tagget, his arm brushing briefly against hers.

      Felicia stepped hastily back, and he turned his head. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured. His eyes lingered on her—not too blatantly, but in the manner of a man appreciating a good-looking woman, and with a hint of interested enquiry.

      Felicia managed a tight smile before she walked away, ostensibly to photograph one of the bronze cranes on the terrace, and heard Joshua’s deep voice ask Jen a question about the intricate carved ceiling of the throne room. She felt her hands clench, and with a sense of rising panic wondered how she was going to stand three weeks of his proximity

      There was some comfort at least in knowing he had no idea who she was. She would just keep out of his way as much as possible and pretend they had never met. There was no reason to let his presence destroy her enjoyment.

      By the time the party had passed through the Gate of Earthly Tranquillity to the Imperial Garden where plants and trees gave an illusion of coolness, they were relieved to take a rest.

      The guide pointed out two intertwined old trees. They are called “the love trees”.

      Joshua laughed quietly, and Felicia thought with unaccustomed viciousness, Yes, you can laugh at love—it was always a game to you.

      But it hadn’t been a game to poor Genevieve. Genevieve had died for it, while Joshua walked away unscathed.

      They left the Forbidden City for the Summer Palace and lunch at the Ting Li Guan restaurant. ‘This means in English, the Pavilion for Listening to the Orioles Sing,’ Jen informed them.

      ‘Oh, isn’t that charming!’ Maggie exclaimed.

      ‘Lovely,’ Felicia agreed, manoeuvring herself into a chair as far from Joshua Tagget as possible before taking off her hat and sunglasses. She was surprised to find that she was hungry as well as thirsty. Tucking into prawns, rice and something deep-fried that was unfamiliar but delicious, she almost managed to forget the man she’d been carefully avoiding all morning.

      The restaurant lay on a lake shore, and after eating they were taken across the water in a canopied boat with a dragon’s head at the bow. Seated at one side of the boat between Maggie and a young couple holding hands, Felicia removed her sunglasses to focus her camera on a series of glittering curved roofs gracing the steep, wooded hillside above the lake. She felt a breeze tug at her hat, and was too late to save it from being whisked off her head.

      It didn’t fly straight to the water, but instead skimmed a few yards along the boat, where a tanned, masculine hand stretched out and captured it.

      A few people laughed and applauded, and Felicia stood up—just as Joshua did the same, her hat still held in his hand.

      He stepped towards her and, her hair whipping about her face, she reached for the hat. ‘Thank you.’

      ‘My pleasure.’ He was smiling, but with a faint frown between his brows as if he was trying to place her. His gaze dropped momentarily to her name tag. ‘I’d hang onto the headgear if I were you.’

      ‘Yes,’ she said, and returned to her seat.

      Instead of reclaiming his own he followed her, placing a hand on one of the posts supporting the canopy above them as he looked down at her.

      Felicia turned her face away, studying the hired canoes and other small ferries dotting the ruffled waters of the lake.

      ‘I know it’s an old line,’ Joshua said, ‘but do I know you from somewhere?’

      Felicia swallowed before turning an indifferent, clear blue gaze on him. ‘You’re right,’ she said coolly, not bothering to lower her voice, then paused. ‘It is an old line.’

      She turned again to contemplate the view. Maggie made a small, protesting sound. The male half of the young couple cast Joshua a sympathetic glance, and the girl smothered a giggle.

      Felicia couldn’t see the expression on Joshua’s face as he received the very public snub, but after a moment she heard him laugh softly,

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