by Fiona Walker
‘This would be Ptolemy Finch with the silent P?’
She nodded. ‘He’s such a perfect hero.’
‘Surely creation and creator are never that far apart?’
‘I’m not in a position to judge. I’ve never met Gordon. Nobody at the agency has apart from Conrad.’
Lucky old Conrad.’ He drained his wine glass and topped it up.
Legs covered her still-full glass as the wine bottle passed over. ‘Isn’t he just? I’d love to meet Gordon in person one day. Maybe he’ll come here,’ she mused idly, looking around at the dark beams and guttering candles. ‘Everybody loves it here.’
He laid down his fork, dark brows lifting.
She glanced over each shoulder and craned forwards, whispering. ‘Gordon might be speaking at the Farcombe festival this year.’
‘In disguise, I assume?’
She shook her head, eyes widening as she delighted in sharing a much more interesting secret than her ragged love-life. ‘He’s going to show his face at last.’
‘Wow.’ He reached for his wine glass and eyed her over it as he sank an inch of deep crimson Rioja, the embers igniting in the black coals of his eyes.
‘Wow indeed.’ Legs nodded eagerly, grateful they were on song at last.
‘And you like his stuff?’ he pulled a face, although whether this was a comment on the wine or the world’s bestselling author was unclear.
‘Love it.’ She smiled widely, eyes sparkling as she felt herself on safe ground at last. ‘Ptolemy Finch is such a glorious character. My nephew Nico is obsessed, and rightly so. He’s every kid in a way. He’s me and my mate Daisy at that age, and he’s totally Francis as a boy.’ Her eyes filled with tears as the safe ground fell away from beneath her feet. Damn that wine. She stuffed in some more paella hoping he hadn’t noticed as she rushed on: ‘I can’t wait for the next one. Conrad says it’s shit hot.’
‘Shit,’ he agreed, whirling the ladle in the delicious witches brew before helping them both to more of its steaming contents. ‘Hot.’
‘You don’t like the books?’
‘I think they’re formulaic,’ he said flatly.
‘As are Hollywood movies, soaps, magazines, newspapers. We devour formulas. This recipe is a formula.’ She waved a forkful of paella around. ‘It’s still divine. What makes it unique is the execution, not the formula. Ptolemy Finch is divine!’
‘And deserving of a fine execution.’ He refilled his wine glass.
Legs had managed to keep hers half full and again held her hand over the rim to resist more. ‘So what do you like to read?’
‘Faces.’ He stared unashamedly into hers.
Boy, was he unsettling. His expression was so critical, yet those dark eyes blazed with a lighthouse glow, steering her to safe harbour. She felt seasick.
‘Read any good ones lately?’
‘Just the usual trash.’ He drank more wine, turning the tables on their already head-spinning dinner.
Legs ran her tongue around her teeth, refusing to rise. She was almost past the finishing line. The paella dish was all but empty. He had to give the Book Inn the thumbs-up if she just stayed calm and engaged him in light, flirtatious conversation.
She tried to think up a charming, generous way to open him up and loosen his tongue. Then she remembered something that Conrad had asked her during her first job interview which had made her laugh. She’d relaxed then, in a way that he later told her got her the job, making it hers no matter what her answer had been. ‘So tell me, er,’ she fudged past his missing Christian name, ‘if you were a biscuit, which one would it be?’
As soon as she asked it, she realised how silly it sounded. It was hard to believe she’d been so bowled over by Conrad posing it in the first place, although she supposed coming out of the mouth of a literary maverick lent it psychological gravitas and deep absurdity, whereas from her lips it was just inane.
He looked blank. ‘That’s a non sequitur.’
‘Is that a type of Italian cantucci?’ Trying to salvage the situation with a cheery joke just made it ten times worse.
He drained his glass and refilled it, clearly trying to anaesthetise himself against her one-liners with Rioja.
She reddened, mortification crawling all over her as she changed conversational tack with mounting desperation. ‘I saw you running earlier. I love a man who keeps fit. Do you do other sports?’
‘Free climbing.’
‘How thrilling. That must be so dangerous. Have you ever fallen?’
‘Never.’
‘How about in love?’
He looked at her levelly, not dignifying it with an answer.
‘With someone you shouldn’t have fallen in love with?’ she was almost singing now, Buzzcocks in her head.
‘Not lately.’
God, he was hard work.
The restaurant was crammed to the rafters. Despite being called from all sides, Nonny enveloped their table in fragranced exclusivity as she asked after the meal, patting Legs on the back before covertly signalling her with her eyes to hurry up. This was all far too subtle for squiffy Legs who raved a lot about the fantastic paella and was happy to acquiesce as Byrne asked for the pudding menu and requested more wine.
As Nonny wiggled seductively away, Legs noticed Byrne admiring her pert, tailored bottom.
‘Is there a Mrs Byrne?’ she asked, eager to charter a new course.
‘There are many, my grandmother among them.’ He drained his glass, tapping the edge of its base impatiently on the table as the full force of his eyes struck hers once more. ‘I think a marriage of true minds takes too much artificial intelligence for me.’ He fell gratefully on the arriving wine bottle and topped up his glass to the brim.
‘Maybe you’re waiting for a sublime cook?’ she suggested kindly, covering her own glass once more as he swung the bottle across to fill it.
‘I can cook for myself,’ he assured her.
‘Don’t you get lonely?’
‘I have plenty of company.’
‘Must be very forgiving company if you only cook for yourself,’ she mused. ‘Or do you have lots of friends on a diet?’
He shot her a withering look, then glanced up as Anton began to clear. ‘That was delicious. Chef is a talented man.’
‘I will pass on your compliments, sir.’
The empty paella dish and plates were spirited away by the deadpan head waiter, whose only betrayal of glee was joyfully clicking heels and sashaying his pert buttocks, which Legs admired all the way to the swinging kitchen doors, not caring that Byrne was watching her critically. Two could play at bottom-ogling, she decided. She knew that she was behaving atrociously tonight, infantile and indiscreet and self-indulgent in equal measure. He made for completely disorienting company, so full of insight and disapproval, as though he could see straight into her soul and found it wholly lacking.
When Anton swaggered back, she lowered the standard to crotch-watching, simply because she knew Byrne was on her case. He tactfully said nothing.
The pudding list read so seductively it reignited her food lust, but she was damned if she’d show it.
‘I’ll pass.’ She handed it back to Anton when he returned, feeling the bittersweet pinch of abstinence.
Ignoring her, Byrne ordered the dessert tasting menu for two. Legs was about to protest, but remembered that she was supposed to be helping the restaurant get a Michelin star and shut up. She’d already done enough damage.
‘I have a sweet tooth.’ He flashed his first smile in over an hour. ‘You?’
‘Just a sharp tongue.’
‘To match the acid wit, I take it?’ His gaze held hers.
‘I was under the impression that you find my brand of humour very silly?’
The smile widened with laughter. ‘Silliness is an underrated virtue. I take life far too seriously, Heavenly Pony, don’t you think?’
‘Maybe you’ve been reading too many miserable faces lately?’
�
��I like the one I’m reading now.’ His eyes didn’t leave hers.
‘Not the usual trash then?’ She suddenly didn’t know what to do with her face.
‘I thought it was fairly predictable at first, but it keeps taking me by surprise, and now I just can’t figure out what happens next.’
Still under excitingly close scrutiny, Legs was struggling not to twitch and go cross-eyed as all her facial muscles developed hitherto unknown ticks. ‘Probably got a lot of nasty plot twists and a sting in its tale,’ she blustered. ‘But then everyone lives happily ever after. Not really your thing, I should imagine.’
Those big, smouldering coal eyes glowed into hers. ‘So you don’t think I like happy endings, Heavenly Pony?’
He was the one getting a bit drunk now, she realised.
While she hadn’t exactly sobered up, she had enough alarm bells ringing in her head to keep her senses on amber alert and advise extreme caution.
‘I don’t know you well enough to judge.’
Still his eyes stayed locked on hers. He said nothing, and Legs suddenly found it quite impossible to look away.
‘I never judge a book by its cover,’ she went on nervously, ‘especially in a restaurant with so many covers.’
The candle between them was guttering. Dropping eye contact at last, Byrne ran a finger across the flickering yellow flame.
Legs was in nervous gabble mode now, ‘I always used to wonder as a kid why they called it a naked flame when there were never any dressed flames. I suppose all their clothes would burn off.’
‘Are old flames best naked or dressed, I wonder?’ he asked quietly.
She swallowed uncomfortably.
Up came the eyes again, gaze trapping hers, ‘Aren’t you grown up enough to know not to play with fire, Allegra?’
Legs wasn’t certain whether he was talking about the Francis situation, or something much closer to home that was threatening to ignite the table between them right now. She heard the alarm bells in her head again, this time joined by the screech of a smoke detector. She needed Conrad to come marching into the restaurant dressed as a firefighter, hose unrolled ready to douse the man who was now playing with her emotions as carelessly as a kid with matches shooting out sparks.
Even from their brief acquaintance, Legs saw that Byrne was arrogant, circuitous, and dangerously sexy. He had one-night-stand eyes and he had the better room. He’d be gone in the morning and she would never have to see him again.
I must be drunk to be this tempted, she realised giddily. Alcohol always fuelled her flirtatious streak.
A soft touch against her bare arm almost sent her into orbit as she leapt away, pulses thrumming.
But it was only Anton the waiter leaning past her to place the taster menu on the table, the serviette on his arm brushing her skin.
‘It’s just desserts, Allegra.’ Byrne smiled across at her, those coal and fire eyes dancing like the flame of the guttering candle.
‘Just desserts,’ she repeated, looking at them, grateful to have more food as a distraction.
Greed overcame her once more as she regarded the tempting little ceramic miniatures and thimble-sized glasses, like doll’s-house food. Her spoon clashed with Byrne’s as they dived in, hooking it clean out of his hand. An entire pot of honeycomb sorbet was upended and spilled across the table. Without thinking, she dabbed her finger into the sweet, foamy spatter on the tablecloth directly in front of her and sucked it appreciatively.
She sensed Byrne’s intent gaze resting on her.
‘Sorry – that was really sluttish.’ She reached for her napkin. ‘I’m not normally this badly behaved.’
‘That’s a shame.’ His voice was so quiet she could barely hear it.
The guttering candle let out a long, low hiss like a hot breath, then crackled as the fat end of the wick spluttered before bursting gaily into a brighter, death-throe flame. A lifelong flirt like Legs struggled not to cup her hands and breathe on the flames to fan them, however dangerous she knew that to be.
Then, looking up, she suddenly realised that the fire was out of control already.
His eyes trapped hers, and in that instant the spark between them combusted horribly and inappropriately, at least it did on Legs’ side of the table. The water cooler office fantasy was nothing on this level of total, wipe-out attraction. Adrenalin and pheromones fuelled the blaze, as she felt lust grip her in a firefighter’s lift. She wanted to climb across the table and seduce him there and then. With a monumental effort, she fought the wine and sugar rush that was warping her brain, reminding herself she had never had a one-night stand, and this was not the weekend to start.
It had been an over-emotional twenty-four hours, she told herself. Her craving for escapism had got out of control; being away from Conrad had made her weak-willed and fantasist. She needed to go to bed with a good book, not a stranger.
Byrne was still watching her face: ‘Why do I have a feeling I’ve just reached a row of dots?’
Legs looked at him in confusion. ‘I – um – I think I should – that is—’
A drumbeat started up in the main pub, making them both jump. Boom, boom, boom.
It broke the tension, like a gun blowing out a lock. Legs knew she had just seconds to make her escape or her sugar rush lust would take over again.
‘You finish pudding; I’ll order our coffees at the bar!’ A triple espresso was just the chastity belt she needed. She fled with relieved glee, his eyes burning holes through her back.
Abandoning him to his rosewater and vanilla crème brûlée as she weaved away through the crowded tables, she distinctly heard him let out a long sigh, crack his spoon through the crisp caramel top and say, ‘That’s what I meant …’
Chapter 11
Mannequin cool now melting in the face of an overbooked restaurant and mutinously hungover chef, Nonny intercepted Legs en route to the bar. ‘Guy is in pieces. Whatever were you thinking of ordering the paella?’
‘You said to avoid the crab. Byrne loved it.’
‘He’d better give us a Michelin star,’ Nonny fretted. ‘I’ve had to turn away our eight o’clock couple twice, and now I’ve lost them.’
Glancing up at the clock, Legs realised it was well past nine.
She still felt horribly squiffy as she weaved through to the bar to order coffee as the live act struck up, a jolly bluegrass band.
‘What did Guy mean they were well connected?’ She asked Tongue Piercing, who was looking rattled as she manned the optics.
‘Check out the guitarist,’ she lisped back, nodding at a chunky, bearded figure in dark glasses, hunched over a steel-stringed Gibson.
‘Is that who I think it is?’ she asked, but TP was gone.
Nursing two espressos and a most probably ill-advised Dark and Stormy Night-cap offered on the house, Legs backed into a dark corner, hoping Byrne didn’t follow her and equally praying he did.
He did, looking sexy as hell, despite carrying a mock crock handbag.
‘Yours I believe.’ He handed it over and claimed a coffee, wincing at the volume of the band.
‘Check out the guitarist,’ she muttered in his ear, then wished she hadn’t because he smelled intoxicatingly good.
‘Am I supposed to know him?’
‘Biggest hit of the decade. Married to a Hollywood superstar and yoga-juicing advocate. Has an organic farm in the Cotswolds. Voted world’s sexiest man at least twice …’
But Byrne wasn’t looking at the stage. He was looking into her face again and threatening to combust the room around them. Legs was certain the sparks coming off them would ignite her own clothing any minute, particularly as so much of it was artificial fibre.
Grasping around for something to say to douse the rising heat, she remembered her promise to her landlord. ‘Guy wants me to sing with the band later,’ she spluttered, sounding like an X Factor wannabe, but at least it dampened the flames, particularly as she had to repeat it three times before Byrne could hear over t
he music.
‘You sing?’ he shouted back.
‘After a fashion; my parents had me classically trained as a child, but I’ve never had my sister’s musical talent. I used to perform here with friends sometimes. The A&R men stayed away.’ Her voice was going hoarse trying to be heard.
He steered her further into a dark recess. ‘So you wanted to be a famous rock star?’ He spoke into her ear, audible at last. She jumped away because her ear was scorching hornily, only to find the inferno was still blazing away in his eyes.
‘For about five minutes,’ she laughed nervously, glancing at the legend on stage. ‘I could never cope with his life. If he sneezes, somebody sells the snot on eBay. Count the camera phones.’
Now they looked there were at least twenty, and Pierced Tongue was brazenly waving an HD camcorder over the bar.
‘This will be all over YouTube by midnight.’
‘So why is he here?’
‘Because this is the closest to the old days he’s ever going to get. Nobody’s mobbing him, the paparazzi haven’t heard he’s here and it’s too far to drive even if they did. Guy and Nonny know everybody who’s anybody and tell nobody. That’s a rare thing. I am the opposite.’ She blushed as she realised she was leaning right up against him and had no idea how she’d got there. She jumped hastily away. ‘I’m a hopeless blabbermouth, and would make a lousy celebrity,’ she finished hurriedly.
‘Hard to keep secrets if you’re famous.’ He watched her closely, his eyes like flame-throwers lighting up her libido.
‘All one’s bad habits would be exposed like a flash,’ she agreed, backing quickly out of the recess so the music got too loud to speak and the clammy heat of the room soothed her lust-scorched skin.
Bad, bad habits like flirtatious, fickle all-out desire for a complete stranger, she told herself in a panic. She was practically sober again now, high grade espresso flushing her veins. She reminded herself that she was still in a relationship with Conrad and possibly still in love with Francis too, and life was much too complicated already.