LITMIR.BIZ

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a girl has to do, and you must admit he’s some sort of hunk. I don’t remember him being so drop-dead gorgeous when we were children.’

      ‘Probably because the last time you saw him you were a kid with pigtails and braces and more interested in horses than boys.’ Susan was petrified of horses and had been frankly incredulous when Jennie had told them one day she had ridden all the time as a child and had had her own pony called Primrose.

      ‘True.’ Jennie started on her third waffle. ‘But I’m very interested now and I haven’t given up on Zac yet. I mean, as family it’s my duty to show him around while he’s here and look after him.’ She tried an innocent smile that didn’t fool anyone.

      Susan spluttered half her waffle onto her plate. ‘And we all know how you want to look after him,’ she said lewdly, rolling her eyes. ‘And cooking dinner for him is the tip of the iceberg.’

      Jennie didn’t deny it. ‘I bet he’s great in bed,’ she said dreamily. ‘Sexy, experienced but considerate, you know?’

      Rachel found she couldn’t sit and listen any longer. Abruptly, she said as she stood up, ‘I had a disaster at work yesterday and I need to be in early. I’m not at all sure I’ll still have a job soon, to be honest.’

      ‘Oh, no.’ Both girls were instantly all concern and comfort, and as she detailed what had happened they said the right things in the right places and were suitably scathing about the sales team. It helped how she was feeling. A bit.

      As she left them, Rachel said offhandedly, ‘Is Zac having dinner with us again tonight?’ and hoped the jitters that had assailed her all morning since waking weren’t evident in her voice.

      ‘Nope, he’s busy.’ Jennie’s voice brightened as she added, ‘But I’ve got his number and I’ll try later for tomorrow. I might suggest treating him to dinner at Alfredo’s and then taking him to a nightspot. What do you think? Somewhere where the dance floor is small and cosy so we can get in the mood.’

      ‘I take it you mean a nightspot followed by his hotel room?’ Susan winked at Rachel, who had paused in the doorway.

      ‘Absolutely,’ Jennie agreed cheerfully. ‘Or just his hotel room.’

      ‘Jennie, you’re such an out-and-out tart.’

      ‘I know. Tarts have all the fun.’

      Rachel left the other two amiably chaffing each other but she wasn’t smiling as she fetched her coat and handbag from her room. Jennie had never made any secret of the fact she slept with all her boyfriends and enjoyed sex, and although Susan was a little more choosy, she’d had a few partners too.

      Here again she was the odd one out. She stared at her reflection in the long mirror on the bedroom wall. Jennie and Susan had thought it hilarious in their university days when she had said she was waiting for Mr Right before sleeping with a boy, but back then she had imagined he would come along before too long. And the truth of it was she had never met anyone who had made her pulse flutter and tempted her before Giles, so it hadn’t been too difficult to hang onto the dream. She’d had lots of boyfriends before him and had enjoyed kissing and cuddling and a bit of petting, but whenever they’d pressed for more she had known she would regret it the next morning. It was just the way she was made. She’d long ago come to terms with the fact that she was an oddity in her group of friends.

      Rachel frowned at the brown-haired girl in the mirror. She wanted it to be special with the man she fell in love with, a forever thing, something that meant more than words could explain, but after Giles she was wondering if love as she saw it even existed. And she didn’t want to die an old maid.

      What had kept her from sleeping with Giles? He’d certainly pestered her enough in the last couple of months before he had proposed, and she had imagined herself in love with him, hadn’t she? Her frown deepened. Hadn’t she?

      Yes, she had thought she loved him but something hadn’t been quite…right. Even then some sixth sense must have been telling her he wasn’t what he seemed, that he had been projecting an image he’d thought she’d wanted him to be.

      She shut her eyes tightly, biting on her lip. Jennie was right and she was wrong. She should have slept with every Tom, Dick and Harry and had fun; sex was just a pleasant pastime between a man and a woman and didn’t have to be an emotional forever thing. It didn’t have to lead to marriage and babies.

      Her eyes opened. But it would need to for her. She simply couldn’t imagine opening her life and her body to a man and then cheerfully waving goodbye to him whenever the relationship ended. Jennie could. She couldn’t. End of story. She didn’t want to go through life alone but if she had to, she would. Loads of women concentrated on their career these days and chose autonomy and had rich and fulfilling lives. She just hadn’t imagined that was the way her life would go when she had been younger.

      She took a deep breath. She could hear Jennie singing a pop song in the bathroom and smiled wryly to herself. The world did indeed ‘rain down men’ on Jennie; no sooner had her friend disposed of one man than another took his place. She envied her. Oh, how she envied her. No heart-searching, no agonising, no emotional baggage. Jennie ate when she was hungry, drank when she was thirsty and slept with a man when she wanted sex. And Jennie never felt that she was a failure and had missed the boat in a hundred and one ways.

      At the end of the day Rachel still had a job, so she supposed she could count it a success. She’d gone for lunch with a group of girls from the office but although she had joined in the conversation and acted naturally, part of her—annoyingly—had kept repeating a post-mortem of the night before.

      If she analysed it, she couldn’t quite understand why Zac Lawson had got under her skin the way he had. It hadn’t been so much what he’d said or done as the way he’d said and done it, she told herself. A certain inflexion, a tone of voice, a look, and perfectly mundane words could have a whole different meaning. Even simple words like ‘Thank you’ could change according to the way someone spoke or the expression on their face—it could be grateful or sarcastic or wry or a whole host of things. But however much she tried to wriggle out of it, she had to admit she’d been uncharacteristically belligerent from the second she’d set eyes on Jennie’s cousin. And she didn’t like herself for it.

      She sighed as she pulled on her coat at the end of the day, after switching off her computer and tidying her desk. If she saw Zac again she’d be politely friendly, she determined, for Jennie’s sake. She didn’t like him—in fact, she’d never met a man she liked less—but that couldn’t be helped and Jennie needn’t know. And it wasn’t as if he would be around for long anyway; she could force herself to be civil to the poor man for the short time he was in the country if their paths crossed.

      It was raining again when she walked down the steps of the office building and her umbrella was safely propped up in the hallstand at the flat. In the couple of years since she’d bought it, she’d only used it a handful of times, she reflected ruefully.

      She had reached the pavement before she saw him, leaning nonchalantly against the wall of the building next door.

      ‘No umbrella again?’ The velvet voice with its faintest of Canadian undertones mocked her wide-eyed surprise. As he reached her, he sheltered her under his own black monster of an umbrella. ‘Do you actually like getting wet through?’

      He’d slipped a casual arm round her waist as he’d drawn her out of the rain and she was aware of feeling very feminine against his broad-shouldered bulk. Then the dumbness brought about by shock faded and she found her voice. Carefully pulling back so there was a couple of inches between them, she said tightly, ‘What are you doing here?’

      ‘Isn’t it obvious? Rescuing a damsel in distress.’

      ‘I’m not in distress.’

      ‘You would be if you walked home in this lot.’

      The rain was coming down faster now, thudding on top of the umbrella in great icy drops that annoyingly backed up his statement. Rachel swallowed

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