LITMIR.BIZ

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flew past with Kat juggling rehearsals and shifts at the café. She spent most evenings with Flynn but insisted on returning to her own bed next door. The Carstairs family was coming back the following week and she wanted to make sure everything was in tip-top shape for their arrival.

      On set, Elisabetta was her usual demanding self, but Kat came to look forward to their scenes together onstage. She felt inspired by the older woman’s talent and knew when Elisabetta pulled her up for something it was because she knew Kat could give more, could dig deeper, could perform from her heart and soul instead of simply acting out a role. Elisabetta loved acting the way Kat loved it. It was a driving passion, an ambition she’d had since she was young.

      Kat found it a little weird to have struck up a tentative friendship with her biological father’s wife, but over the course of the rehearsals she felt a bond growing between Elisabetta and herself that she never would have predicted. She wouldn’t have described them as friends, by any measure of the word, but she liked to think Elisabetta respected her for her willingness to learn. In a rare moment in the dressing room, Elisabetta even told Kat some of her anguish over finding out about Richard’s affair with Kat’s mother.

      ‘I hated her and I hated him,’ Elisabetta said, leaning forward to apply a fresh coat of lipstick. She pressed her lips together. ‘The worst thing was, he was still seeing her when he’d reconciled with me.’

      ‘I know,’ Kat said. ‘I don’t know how you could stay married to him after that. I would’ve divorced him in a flash.’

      Elisabetta turned on her chair in front of the lighted mirror, her expression a little wistful. ‘Have you ever been passionately in love?’

      Kat opened and closed her suddenly dry mouth. ‘I...erm...’

      ‘I loved Richard from the moment I met him,’ Elisabetta said. ‘I looked into his eyes and wham. That was it. But I hate him too. Some days the hate wins, other days the love does. Right now, I’m undecided.’

      ‘Do you think he’s learned his lesson?’ Kat asked.

      Elisabetta sighed as she picked up her hairbrush. She examined it for a moment before absently drawing a couple of hairs free from the bristles. ‘Who knows? Some men never do.’

      Kat let a little silence pass before she asked, ‘Do you think I should go to his party on Saturday? I mean, would it upset you if I did?’

      Elisabetta’s hand tightened on the hairbrush, the tendons on her hand standing out like white cords. But then she relaxed her hand and began brushing her hair as casually as you pleased. Swish... Swish... Swish... ‘It’s no skin off my nose what you do. I don’t care either way.’

      If Kat hadn’t been an actor herself she would have believed Elisabetta. She would have taken her answer at face value. But something about the older woman’s indifferent tone rang an alarm bell. What if by going to the party Kat upset Elisabetta? What could be worse at your husband’s Sixty Years in Showbiz party than his dirty little secret showing up? Her friendship with Elisabetta—if you could call it that—was too fragile, too new, to compromise it. Her career was balanced on the high wire of Elisabetta’s approval. She couldn’t risk it. Not for the man who hadn’t wanted her to be born in the first place.

      But what about Flynn?

      He’ll understand.

      You think?

      Kat didn’t want to think about it. The topic of Richard’s party was the elephant in the room whenever she was with Flynn. An elephant with halitosis. Neither of them had mentioned Richard’s party in the last couple of weeks. But as she walked Cricket later that day she knew she would have to give Flynn an answer one way or the other.

      * * *

      Flynn listened as his male client ranted about his soon-to-be-ex-wife in between raving about his replacement of her with a woman half his age. This was his fourth client today, all of them desperate to extricate themselves out of their marriages, and yet, strangely, Flynn could think of nothing but the good side of marriage. When he heard his client try and justify his actions in taking a mistress, because his wife had been sick during her pregnancy for a couple of months and not interested in sex, Flynn’s back came up. What about the promise of ‘in sickness and in health’? Wasn’t that supposed to mean something?

      He thought of Kat coming day in and day out to help him. Sure, he’d playfully blackmailed her, but she could have easily told him where to go. But instead, she had adjusted her timetable to see to his and Cricket’s needs.

      His needs...

      His needs were not just physical. He could have those met in the way he used to—with a casual date for a week or two. His needs now were more cerebral. He looked forward to seeing Kat, talking to her, listening to her. Watching her. Loving her.

      Loving her.

      For once, Flynn didn’t push the thought aside. He didn’t shove it back behind the locked door in his brain. He didn’t fight it. He let it flow through his mind, sweeping away the doubts that had lingered for too long. Of course he loved her. Hadn’t he fallen in love with her that first day? Her feisty little stand-off had made him fall like a pebble kicked off a cliff. Kissing her had sealed the deal. Making love with her had cemented it. Now there was one last step he had to take to set it in stone.

      To set it in stone for ever.

      ‘Till death do us part’ was a promise Flynn wanted to make. Ached to make. He had shied away from it all those years because he hadn’t met the right person. The person he felt he could live with for the rest of his life. Before now, the promises had seemed claustrophobic, strangling, suffocating.

      Now they made sense.

      With Kat everything made sense.

      * * *

      Flynn was home by the time Kat got back from her walk with the dog. He was in the sitting room but instead of sitting on the sofa with his foot up he was standing on his crutches looking out of the window. He turned when she came in but his expression was difficult to read. ‘Hi.’

      ‘Hi.’

      Was he going to come over and kiss her like he usually did? Why was he standing all the way over there? He didn’t even seem aware of Cricket, who was dancing around his ankles in a frenzy of delight. But then, as if the little dog sensed the gravity of Flynn’s mood, he lowered himself to the floor in a submissive ‘stay’ position, his scruffy little head resting on his paws.

      ‘Is...is something wrong?’ Kat asked. ‘You seem a little tense. Not just today but for the last couple of weeks. Is it work? Your foot? Your family?’ Me?

      He gave her a smile that only involved half his mouth. ‘I’ve been waiting for you.’

      Kat hung up her coat, pulled off her gloves and put them on the hallstand. ‘I told you I was going to be late. We had to do a dress rehearsal and then Elisabetta had an issue with the way her hair was done. Honestly, she can be such a pain in the butt.’

      There was a weird little silence.

      She looked at him again, her heart jerking as if it had been kicked. ‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

      His expression lost its surface tension, as if something deep inside him had softened. Melted. ‘I never thought I’d do this again.’

      ‘Do what?’

      ‘Ask someone to marry me.’

      Kat stared at him in a stunned silence. She blinked and opened her mouth to speak but no words came out. Shock ran through her like a stupefying drug. She couldn’t get her thoughts to process properly. It was as though someone had scrambled her brain, shaken it up until none of her synapses were connecting. Why would he ask her to marry him? He wasn’t in love with her...was he? He had never said. Never hinted. Not one word.

      Flynn came closer and, leaning on one crutch, cupped her cheek in his hand. ‘I’m sorry I can’t get down on bended knee but I love

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