by Maggie Cox
‘Thanks all the same, but I won’t. The accounts beckon, I’m afraid. By the way—I made a couple of Victoria sponges to take into the café tomorrow. Help yourself if you’d like some with your coffee. It’s nice to see you again, Drake … even if you did kidnap my beautiful sister for the weekend!’
‘It’s good to see you too,’ Drake murmured, right then feeling anything but friendly towards the other man.
He was glad to be invited upstairs to Layla’s flat so that they could have some privacy. Back at the house in Mayfair, he’d asked her if she thought his home lacked warmth. Glancing round the cosy living-room in her flat, with its sandalwood-scented air, homely feminine touches, mismatched furniture, family portraits on the walls and enough candles in the fireplace to light a cathedral, it wasn’t a question she would ever have to ask him. Her home was an irresistibly warm expression of the lovely woman who inhabited it, and Drake was suddenly unsure about the hopes he’d subconsciously been nurturing over the weekend.
What could he possibly offer a woman like Layla, apart from what his material wealth could provide? he wondered. Having come into contact with her generous heart and concern for others, he doubted whether that would even be an inducement. Why would she want to leave a home she loved with a brother who adored and looked out for her to move up to London and live with him? he mused. Especially when her experience of living and working there previously had been indelibly soured by an unscrupulous boss who had swindled her out of her life savings and seduced her. Wasn’t that why she had retreated from city life in the first place? To lick her wounds in a place of safety?
As sure as night followed day, and despite his plans to regenerate the town and improve it, Drake certainly wouldn’t contemplate returning to live with her, no matter how strong his feelings were. And even if they could agree on a mutually acceptable place of residence if they got together permanently, what if one day Layla walked out on him, just as his mother had? What if she made that soul-destroying decision because she’d reached the same conclusion his ex had made about him … that he was ‘emotionally crippled’ and—despite his wealth and success—a poor bet if he couldn’t shake his past? Could he risk such a devastating possibility and be left to live his life without her?
‘Do you fancy a slice of Victoria sponge with your coffee?’ As she returned to the living room from the kitchen Layla’s cheerful voice broke into his bleak introspection.
‘No, thanks.’ He gave an awkward shrug of the shoulders. ‘In fact, I don’t think I’ll stay and have coffee after all. I’ve had my mobile switched off since Friday night, and I’ve probably got at least fifty or sixty messages I need to reply to.’
Her lovely face was immediately crestfallen, and Drake felt like the very worst criminal.
‘Can’t you stay for just half an hour longer? Surely that won’t make a lot of difference? In any case, it won’t be late by the time you get back to London. You’ll have plenty of time to answer your messages then,’ she pointed out reasonably.
Her suggestion was more than tempting, but he had already made up his mind to go. They had spent an amazing and intense time together, but now he needed some space and time alone to get his head straight.
Without thinking he moved across the room and took her into his arms. ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart, I really am. But I’ve got a heavy week ahead of me and there are plans and drawings I need to study, as well as replying to my phone messages. We’ll see each other again very soon … I promise. I’ll ring you just as soon as I know when I can take some time off.’
Her dark eyes looked alternately sad, then resigned. That disappointed and melancholy glance made Drake feel as though someone had punched him hard in the gut.
‘If for some reason you can’t reach me on my mobile you can leave a message with Marc, either here or at the café,’ she told him, her tongue moistening her lips as if they’d suddenly turned dry.
‘Great.’ His fingers firmed possessively round her slim upper arms, the warmth of her satin skin provocatively evident in the sheer silk blouse he had bought her. Desolation settled in the pit of his stomach at the thought of sleeping in his bed tonight without her. ‘It’s been an incredible weekend and I’ve loved every minute of it being with you, Layla,’ he told her honestly, his voice low.
In answer, her pretty lips curved to form the sweetest smile. ‘I’ll never forget lying on the blanket in your office looking up at the stars through that amazing glass ceiling,’ she admitted softly.
‘We’ll do it again some time soon. That’s a promise.’
‘I’ll hold you to that.’ Reaching up on tiptoe, she pressed her lips gently against his. ‘You’d better go before I make a complete fool of myself and cry,’ she said.
Forcing himself to ignore the instinct to plunder and ravish her mouth, as he longed to do, Drake slowly nodded his head. ‘Thanks for everything,’ he murmured, reluctantly extricating himself from their embrace and walking to the door.
‘It was my pleasure,’ Layla murmured, and he turned briefly to give her a smile …
CHAPTER ELEVEN
LAYLA threw herself into a frenzy of activity in a bid to try and keep her anxious thoughts about Drake at bay. When she wasn’t working at the café, serving the trickle of customers that came in throughout the day and keeping it spick and span, she was tidying and de-cluttering her flat, and driving the laden boxes of clothes and bric-a-brac she’d collected to a charity shop in support of sick children. After that, she avidly perused her cookery books to come up with new and enticing recipes that she could cook for herself and Marc.
It was only in the unguarded moments that sneaked up on her from time to time that the memory of Drake—how he looked, the sound of his voice, how it felt when he took her in his arms—had the ability to make her catch her breath and her body ache with longing.
As the interminably long week progressed she relived time and time again the frighteningly naked and poignant smile he’d left her with, wishing she’d had the courage to ask him there and then what was really on his mind. Was it that he’d decided he didn’t want to commit to a relationship with her after all now that he’d revealed so much about his wounded past? Because it made him feel far too exposed and vulnerable? Didn’t he know that she’d rather die than betray him by sharing what he’d told her with anyone else?
When the working week drew to a close without any word from him at all, Layla determinedly resisted the overwhelming urge to ring him. Instead she drove to the building site where Drake had taken her that day to explain his plans for the area’s improvement, in the no doubt unrealistic hope that he might be there. He wasn’t.
When she arrived she saw straight away that the construction workers had clearly shut up shop for the day. The muddied landscape and recently erected scaffolding looked bleak, cold and abandoned … the description could well have been applied to her.
Back in her flat, she nearly jumped out of her skin when the hallway telephone rang. Abandoning the removal of her jacket, she haphazardly shrugged it back onto her shoulders and urgently grabbed the receiver.
It was him … it had to be him.
‘Hello?’
‘Layla? It’s me—Colette.’
She’d never been so disappointed to hear the voice of a friend. It was a loyal pal she occasionally enjoyed ‘girly’ nights in with—drinking wine, putting the world to rights and giggling over the latest rom-com together.
‘Hi,’ she answered, her hand shaking from the onrush of adrenaline that had poured through her when she’d thought the caller might be Drake. ‘How nice to hear from you. It’s been a while. How are you?’
‘I’m good. How about you?’
‘I’m fine, thanks.’ It grieved Layla that she wasn’t able to sound more convincing. A girl needed her friends—especially at times like these—and Colette was a good one.
‘Hmm …’ the other girl commented. ‘You don’t sound fine to me. Want to talk about what’s been going on?’
Was she
a mind-reader? Flushing guiltily, Layla absently curled some silky dark strands of hair round her ear. ‘I’ve met someone, that’s all.’
There was a pause, then Colette asked wondrously, ‘You mean you’ve met a man you’re crazy about?’
‘How did you know?’
‘Because if you weren’t crazy about him you wouldn’t even tell me you’d met someone. You’re not a girl who indulges in casual meaningless encounters … or casual meaningless sex, for that matter. I’ve always sensed that when you finally met a guy you were genuinely attracted to it would have to be all or nothing. Who is he and where did you meet him?’
Feeling protective of Drake’s privacy, and how much or how little she could safely reveal about him, Layla examined the short unvarnished fingernails she’d recently taken to nibbling and sighed. ‘I met him here … in the town.’
‘Is he local?’
‘No. He lives and works in London.’
‘What on earth was he doing here, then?’
The incredulity in her friend’s voice didn’t surprise her. Their town was hardly the jewel of the county … at least not yet. ‘Working … He’s part of the professional team that’s working on the regeneration.’
‘So he’s a town planner or surveyor, perhaps?’
She swallowed hard. ‘Something like that.’
‘Okaay … I can tell you’re being more than a little protective of him … Got any plans for tonight?’
‘No … I don’t.’ Layla wished she was planning on getting ready to see Drake, and it hurt more than she could say that she wasn’t.
‘That’s settled, then. I can tell you’re in need of some friendly advice and support. As soon as I get ready, and pop into the off-licence on the way for a cracking bottle of wine, I’ll be round to pay you a visit. And don’t worry about searching through your collection for a film … we’ll have far too much to chat about for that! Bye for now. I’ll see you soon.’
As she heard the line disconnect at the other end Layla stared blankly at the wall, wondering miserably if she could summon up the energy to share confidences with a well-meaning friend when in all honesty she’d much rather crawl under the duvet and cry …
He’d sat in the car outside the house for almost ten minutes, mentally rehearsing what he was going to say to her. The first hurdle Drake had to cross was whether Layla was actually in, because he hadn’t phoned ahead to let her know he was coming. When he’d seen the lights shining from the windows of the upper floor he had murmured a fervent and relieved, ‘Thank God …’ and told himself that fate must be on his side after all.
Now that he was here he could hardly believe he’d so foolishly stayed away from her for an entire week. Yes, he had genuinely had a workload that barely gave him time to draw breath, but the real reason he hadn’t rung her was because he’d had a nagging story running in his head about her being unwilling to compromise on what she wanted. Consequently he’d allowed the twin gremlins of doubt and fear to prevent him from taking the courageous step he needed to.
This morning, for the first time in days, Drake had woken with the clarity of mind he’d prayed for and his heart filled with absolute certainty about what he should do. But now that he was here, sitting outside the gracious Victorian house that Layla had grown up in, he suddenly felt unsure again. After all, there was no guarantee that she’d be happy to see him, was there? Not after he’d so abruptly cut their last evening together short without any real explanation. What if she thought he was a terrible coward … even worse an unreliable bastard?
‘Damn!’ A colourful expletive followed his frustrated exclamation, and hurriedly stepping out onto the pavement from the Aston Martin that he’d told Jimmy he would drive himself that evening, he closed the door shut with a slam.
Straightening the blue silk tie he wore with his tailored suit, he climbed the wide stone steps up to the front door, his heart hammering harder than if he’d received a prestigious commission from the Queen herself. When he rang the bell, and shortly afterwards saw the hallway light come on through the frosted panes in the door, he stood there in dry-mouthed anticipation of seeing Layla again, fervently hoping that nothing would jinx the event.
‘Well, well, well—as you said to me when I paid a surprise visit to your office … To what do I owe the honour?’
Dressed in black skinny jeans and a biscuit-coloured cardigan, with her feet bare, Layla flashed her glossy brown eyes as if Drake was the last person on earth she’d expected or indeed wanted to see. But her less-than-warm welcome made him even more determined to get her to see reason, and his avid gaze roamed her beautiful features with a slow, teasing smile.
‘If I tell you that this past week I’ve missed you more than I’ve ever missed anyone or anything in my life will that get me an invite in for the cup of coffee I so foolishly declined when I was last here?’ he asked, his voice pitched intimately low.
She was still holding onto the doorframe, as if undecided whether to let him over the threshold or not, but there was a glimmer of what he took to be hope in her eyes, and the majority of the tension that had been making his insides ache for days slowly ebbed.
‘That’s all you want? A cup of coffee?’ she quizzed warily.
‘A cup of your expertly made coffee would be a start, I suppose.’
‘A start to what, exactly?’
‘I’m hoping a frank and truthful conversation.’
‘That’s what I’d like too. Okay. But I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait until my friend leaves. She’s popped round to give me a little female support.’
Drake frowned. ‘Support for what?’
Her cheeks turned engagingly pink. ‘There are times when we women need a good friend to turn to. This is one of those times.’
‘Are you saying that you needed to discuss you and me?’ he asked warily.
‘What do you think? Did it even cross your mind that I might be feeling a little low after you left so abruptly on Sunday? We were getting on so well—you even took me back to the street where you grew up and told me about your plan to renovate the houses instead of pulling them down. But then … then we came back here and you suddenly decided you had to leave. I haven’t discussed anything personal with Colette, but I was planning on telling her that I’d met someone that I—Anyway.’ She flushed and glanced down at the floor for a second. ‘That’s when the doorbell rang. You couldn’t have timed your arrival more perfectly if you’d tried.’
‘And what were you going to tell your friend, I wonder? That I took you back to my house, mercilessly seduced you, then took you home and hurriedly made my exit, never to be seen or heard of again?’
Drake tried and failed to keep the angry hurt from his tone. More than he hated the idea of having Layla discuss him with her friend, he abhorred the idea that she might believe he could indeed be so callous.
Her face fell. ‘I would never have described what happened between us like that. Did you honestly think that I would?’
‘Look … can I come in? Can’t you tell Colleen, or whatever her name is, that I’ve driven down from London especially to see you and I really need us to talk?’
The mere idea of Layla having to entertain her friend when he was near desperate to clear the air between them and tell her his feelings made Drake feel tense and impatient again.
In an aggrieved tone she answered, ‘If you’re in that much of a hurry to talk to me, why couldn’t you have rung me earlier in the week to let me know you were coming this evening? And, by the way, it’s Colette—not Colleen. She’s a good friend, and I don’t get to see her that often. I won’t risk offending her by asking her to leave just because you’ve suddenly decided you need to talk to me!’
‘Okay.’ Forcing down his deep disappointment, Drake lifted and dropped his shoulders resignedly. ‘I’ll just wait until she goes, then … if that’s all right with you, I mean?’
‘You’d better come in.’
Removing her hand from the doorfra
me, Layla stood back to allow him entry into the hall. As she went past him to shut the door he had to curl his hand into a fist to stop himself reaching out to touch the shining curtain of dark hair that fell onto her shoulders. Was it only a few short days ago that he’d had the incredible good fortune to do such a thing with impunity?
‘Let’s go upstairs. Colette was about to open the bottle of wine she brought with her. Perhaps you’d like a glass?’
‘I think I’ll decline. I want to keep a clear head this evening.’
‘I’ll just make you some coffee, then.’
‘That would be great … thanks.’
When his avid gaze fell into hers for a full uninterrupted second, the cascade of heat and hunger that assailed him almost made Drake stumble, and his heart thumped hard when he saw by her darkening pupils that Layla was fighting a similar battle.
‘I should have rung you,’ he confessed huskily, ‘but I wanted to get my head straight. I had a lot to think over. Can you forgive me?’
‘You’re here now, and that’s all that matters.’
Her gentle smile was like a wisp of ephemeral smoke—there one minute and gone the next. But, having seen it, he couldn’t help but feel reassured.
At the top of the stairs a pretty young woman with gently waving blonde hair, wearing a tan-coloured raincoat over a smart blouse and jeans, stood waiting for them.
‘You’re not leaving, Colette?’ Layla asked, startled.
‘Sweetheart, you don’t need me to hang around now. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I guessed when I heard a man’s voice that it must be the guy you were going to tell me about.’ She glanced up at Drake with a smile, ‘I’m Layla’s friend Colette.’ She reached out and shook his hand, adding, ‘And you are …?’
‘Drake.’ He didn’t hesitate to give his real name, because something in the girl’s frank blue eyes told him that she was fiercely loyal to Layla. ‘Drake Ashton.’
‘You’re the famous architect that’s helping to regenerate the town?’
He grimaced. ‘I’m just one of a group of professionals that’s been commissioned.’