One-Click Buy: November Harlequin Presents

by Susan Stephens

  Jack sounded doubtful. ‘I thought you said that he was going to give us a fair stab at it.’

  ‘And he’s obviously had a change of heart.’

  ‘You mean he cancelled us? Just like that?’

  ‘Sort of.’

  ‘What does sort of mean?’

  ‘It means that I was put in a position where there was no option but to back out. I’m sorry, Jack. We’ll just have to build ourselves up slowly.’ She had intended to pour her heart out, to tell him of her fiasco of an evening. After all, she and Jack shared everything. But at the last minute she had a change of heart. So at the end of fifteen minutes she hung up feeling as though, somehow, it had been a wasted phone call. Certainly not a call that warranted being made at midnight on a Saturday—one of the few Saturday nights they had taken off, so that Jack could watch his beloved cricket match. And she had got nothing off her chest. She went to bed with the same conflicting thoughts running rampant in her head and woke up, groggy and tired, in the same frame of mind.

  The one salvation was that by the time Jack returned to London she was calmer, more able to explain why she had turned the job down after all, blaming it on her own insecurities, saying that she’d rather it went to an outside party than deal with the suspicion that she had only landed it because of a historical affair that had bitten the dust years ago. The guilt was too much, she explained, with a convincing display of sincerity. Yes, it would have been nice but…such was life. She left him to wonder what exactly had been the catalyst behind her sudden decision and opted for expressions of genuine regret at the passing of a great opportunity. Not, of course, overplaying her hand in case he decided to pursue the unfortunate situation of his own accord.

  She also spent the next two days in a state of muted terror in case Angelo kept his promise and came back to call. She would never have expected it of him, would never have expected him to play around behind his fiancée’s back, but maybe Jack was right, maybe men were all open to a bit of temptation. And she had not held back in her responses. Why not pursue the eager ex when the present fiancée was simply a business arrangement? Wouldn’t that be how he might think?

  She felt like a cat on a hot tin roof, jumping every time the telephone rang, every time someone came to the door with deliveries. She was expecting him to descend on her, and so, when she heard the doorbell of her own house trill at nine in the evening, hours after she had stopped work, she knew who it was going to be. Not Jack. She also knew that she was not going to take the chain off the latch.

  She was rigid with tension as she opened the door a crack. She was also well rehearsed in exactly what she was going to say and the tone of voice she was going to use. Cold, distant, firm.

  But it wasn’t Angelo and her surprise took the wind out of her sails.

  ‘Good evening, Mrs…uh…Miss…’

  ‘Let me in. I want to talk to you.’ Georgina’s cut glass accent cut through her stammering like a knife through butter and Francesca found herself fumbling with the chain and pulling open the door.

  She swept into the house in an elegant swirling cloud of yellow. Yellow jacket, yellow shoes, pale yellow clutch bag. She spent three seconds contemptuously taking in her surroundings before turning her full attention to Francesca.

  Even though Georgina wore high heels Francesca towered over her, not that her height gave her any advantages. The only thought running through her head was that Angelo had told his fiancée about the lapse in his fidelity and Georgina, the business arrangement who wasn’t jealous, obviously wasn’t so much of a business arrangement that she hadn’t seen fit to storm round and have her say. Her very furious say, judging from the expression on her face.

  Francesca cleared her throat and tried to find a way out of the thick fog of guilt engulfing her.

  ‘What…what can I do for you?’

  ’What can you do for me?’

  ‘Look, I think I know why you’ve come here…’

  ‘I’m sure you do,’ Georgina said scathingly. ‘I bet that bastard came running here just as soon as he could.’

  Silence, Francesca thought, was the best form of self-defence. What she had done had been wrong. She deserved every bit of the attack about to be launched at her.

  ‘I should never have considered you for the job. Never! I told Angelo that you were nothing but a two-bit company and I should have stuck to my guns. But oh, no! I thought I would be obliging and go along with giving you a fair try. Didn’t know then what I know now, though, did I? And you, you…you nobody…didn’t see fit to fill me in, did you?’

  Francesca remained in mute silence, mortified and prepared to weather the onslaught. If she could have turned back the hands of time, oh, she would never have agreed to cook dinner for him, would never have agreed to let him into her house in the first place. If, if, if…

  ‘Well, if you and Angelo think that he can break off the engagement so that the pair of you can walk into the sunset holding hands, while I’m left looking a complete idiot in front of my friends, then you’re both in for a shock!’ Georgina’s porcelain skin was mottled with fury.

  ‘He’s broken off the engagement?’ Francesca asked weakly. Oh, dear Lord. Why? She felt her legs on the verge of giving way and decided that sitting down might be a good idea. Crumpling to the floor in a heap would add to her mortification and, aside from that, those very pointed yellow shoes looked as though they could inflict severe damage when wielded by a tiny furious blonde.

  ‘Perhaps we ought to sit down,’ she said and left Georgina no option by heading straight into the sitting room.

  ‘When…when did this happen?’ she asked.

  Georgina wasn’t sitting down. She was pulsating by the window.

  ‘Please don’t pretend that you don’t know. Five days ago.’

  ‘Five days ago?’ Francesca did the maths. So Angelo hadn’t been playing around. He had come to her as a single man. Why hadn’t he said anything? Maybe, she thought slowly, because he had come intending to seduce her and he figured his chances of success would have been lower had she seen herself as no more than a romp in the hay with a man who, even if he was the one to break off the engagement, would still be smarting from the sting of it.

  Or maybe, she thought, digging into her knowledge of him, the way his mind worked, just maybe it had given him a kick to think that he could have her against all the odds, have her blinded to his situation by her own desires. And, if that was the case, had he really even wanted her? The way she had wanted him?

  ‘How did you find out that Angelo and I…?’

  ‘Had once been lovers? Well, certainly not from you! Nor from Angelo. Your partner, Jack, told me.’ Her voice was laced with venom but Francesca still felt sorry for her, sorry for the marriage which wasn’t going to take place, even if for Angelo it had only been a marriage of convenience. Even if it had only been a marriage of convenience for both of them.

  ‘Jack…?’

  ‘Although I would have twigged sooner or later. You might have tried to keep it under wraps but I would have found out. I would have made it my business to find out. Tell me, when did you decide that Angelo was a good bet? Did you see him and think that here was your chance to try and get him, having failed the first time? Or do you sleep with all your male clients in the hope that you might net one of them, and you had the advantage with Angelo because you had already been lovers?’

  ‘I’m sorry about your engagement, Georgina, and I won’t be walking off into any sunset holding hands with Angelo.’ She stood up but didn’t venture too close. Instead, she folded her arms and did her best to remember that, however guilty she felt, this was still her house and she could determine how much of the conversation she wanted to hear. Right now, no more of it. ‘Now, I think it’s time you left.’

  ‘My pleasure. I just came to warn you that you’ll never have him. I won’t have him and neither will you. I’ll see to it.’

  ‘How?’ Francesca asked coldly. Wrong question. Georgina obviou
sly hadn’t worked that one out yet. She delivered one last venomous look and turned on her heel. Not a backward glance. Francesca heard the front door slam and sagged in relief.

  Then she hit the phone.

  She’d expected to be furious with Jack, running to the viper blonde and blabbing things that were none of her business or anyone else’s for that matter, but she wasn’t. As he stammered out an explanation she could only sigh with resignation. He had been concerned about her, hadn’t been able to bear her disappointment at losing the job, had just gone to see Georgina on the off chance that he could persuade her not to jettison the job because Francesca and Angelo had once had a fling years back. How was he to know that the engagement had already been called off? He had known halfway through the conversation that it had been a bad idea but by then it had been too difficult to back down and leave.

  Francesca listened, letting him talk, until there was nothing left to say. She didn’t see how she could tell him what had happened between her and Angelo. It just seemed too complicated and not very relevant anyway.

  The reality was that they no longer had the job, for whatever reasons. It would have been nice, a juicy little add-on to their portfolio, but that, as they said, was life.

  She wasn’t angry with Jack.

  She was, however, angry with Angelo. She had a few hours of restless sleep, during which her anger had time to grow, and by nine the following morning she was in no fit state to placidly start preparing desserts for the Hamiltons’ supper party the following evening.

  Along with the now redundant menus for the wedding that would never take place was his business card.

  Francesca stuck on her most formal suit, a grey skirt with a snappy grey jacket, white shirt underneath, high heels that would elevate her almost to his height, and headed for the City.

  She had left behind an uncomplaining Jack to cover her temporary absence. He was still smarting from his misjudged act of charity on her behalf and was only too happy to do what she wanted. He hadn’t asked where she was going or why it was so important, nor did he quiz her on her flushed cheeks and over-bright eyes.

  There never seemed to be a quiet time in the City, at least not during working hours, and today was no different. She took a taxi to his office.

  What she had expected was precisely what she found. A tall smoked glass building housing branches of various financial institutions. Inside, the foyer was brightly lit. The broad marbled expanse would have been daunting had it not been for the clever interspersing of giant plants that looked as though they belonged in a jungle rather than in the bowels of a building in the centre of London.

  Getting past reception was no problem. She gave Georgina’s name, just in case Angelo had decided to ditch her after his ego-boosting coup at her expense. He might no longer be engaged to the blonde but he would never risk having her create a scene on his turf.

  What a surprise, she fulminated on the way up in the lift, when he was confronted by a six-foot brunette instead of his ex-fiancée.

  His business covered three floors of the impressive building and the directors’ offices were on the top floor. The lift disgorged her into the hushed atmosphere of a library. People were busy with purpose—the purpose of making vast sums of money.

  His secretary met her at the doors of the lift and said, with sweeping understatement, ‘You’re not Miss Thompson.’

  ‘I need to see Angelo and I’m afraid I borrowed Miss Thompson’s name to get up here.’ His secretary had the sort of face that looked as though it responded well to honesty. ‘I’m Francesca Hayley and I am…was…’ Was the broken engagement public knowledge?

  ‘The caterer. May I ask what your business here is, Miss Hayley?’

  ‘Of a personal nature.’

  There was a few seconds of silence, then the woman nodded. ‘He has half an hour before his next meeting…I suppose I could let you see him…’

  His office was at the very end of the elegant, expensive suite of offices. They passed thick wooden doors discreetly shut, behind which Francesca glimpsed the mechanisms of big business in operation.

  Then they were at Angelo’s door, which was open, although the connecting door that led directly to his office was shut.

  ‘I would prefer to surprise him,’ she murmured to the secretary, but that was taking good luck too far. She was shown in, although, when the door was quietly shut behind her, it was as good as a surprise because he was standing with his back to her, looking out of the window down to the matchstick people walking around outside.

  ‘I cannot imagine what you want, Georgina,’ he said, seemingly captivated by the view outside. ‘I have said all there is to say.’

  ‘Well, I haven’t,’ Francesca said. That brought a response. He spun around sharply. ‘In fact, I’ve only just begun, Angelo.’ She stepped forward. ‘Why didn’t you tell me that you had broken off your engagement with Georgina?’

  ‘This is neither the time nor the place for a personal confrontation.’

  ’Conversation.’

  ‘Whatever you want to call it.’ He shrugged, looking at her, and used his intercom to tell his secretary to cancel his meetings for the morning. Taking time off work, something he never did, had never seemed so enticing. He had spent the past couple of days wondering what in hell he was doing. He had broken off his engagement, which he could see now had been a good thing, but still…would he have broken it off had it not been for the reappearance of Francesca in his life? Now he had slept with her and, like a man with an appetite not yet sated, he wanted more. But what for? He would never again make the mistake of offering her a relationship and he had already proved to himself that he could have her. Now she was standing in front of him like an avenging angel and his blood soared with wild elation.

  ‘Did you plan on getting me into bed when you came round to my house?’ Francesca asked bluntly, watching him as he grabbed his jacket.

  ‘I told you. We’ll discuss this out of my office.’

  ‘Why? In case I throw a hissy fit and all your buddies come running to see what’s going on?’

  Angelo paused and looked at her. ‘Now, why do you imagine that I would care what all my buddies think of me? You seem to forget that I own all of them. Who told you about the engagement?’

  ‘Oh, I had a personal visit from your ex-fiancée. It seems she was a little less than impressed that you’d spent months leading her up the garden path only to cast her aside because, apparently, of me.’

  Angelo shot her a cool smile. ‘Georgina needs a reality check. How did she find out about you? I never mentioned it.’

  ‘Jack.’

  ‘Ah. The boyfriend that never was. Come on. We’ll continue this somewhere else.’

  ‘I don’t want to continue this somewhere else.’

  Angelo approached her, his face a grim, unsmiling mask. ‘Let’s get one thing straight, Francesca. You are not throwing a tantrum in my office. You will either leave with me now, and be grateful for the fact that I am making a space in my very packed diary to accommodate you and whatever gripes you seem to have, or you will leave.’

  She sighed heavily and acquiesced, maintaining a steady silence until they were out of the building.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Somewhere more private than an office block.’ He hailed a taxi, leaned in to the window to give the driver an address, while Francesca scrambled into a seat and waited, bristling, for him to join her.

  She opened her mouth to talk and his mobile rang. While she continued to bristle he spoke into his phone, not looking at her. A long, detailed conversation to do with work. She might as well have been invisible.

  Loosely translated, his behaviour was spelling out what she had already suspected. Angelo had made love to her, but not because he cared about her. Years ago he had cared about her, truly cared. Now he just wanted her. She also had to face the cruel fact that her anger was all about the stark truth that she had made love to him and her heart had opened out a
nd welcomed him in, had been waiting in some foolish way for him to return.

  He finished the phone call at roughly the same time as the taxi pulled up in front of an elegant Georgian house set in a crescent of identical houses—gleaming, beautifully proportioned white façades, black wrought iron railings and, lining the pavement outside, sleek, fast cars.

  ‘Where are we?’

  ‘My place. You want to talk? We’ll talk in total privacy.’ And those cool, dark eyes on her, melting her in places she didn’t want, stirring up all kinds of things she could do without, because of the sickening realisation that whatever he had once felt for her had been stripped back to the barest bones, leaving only a searing passion that would never destroy him but very well might destroy her.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HIS house was larger inside than it appeared on the outside. Three floors, each of them compactly and efficiently laid out. The front door opened into a hall with sepia-coloured marble tiles, from which she glimpsed a door leading to a small sitting room. She followed him away from that towards the kitchen which dipped down three stairs and which was a functional blend of chrome and wood.

  He made straight for the coffee percolator and began brewing some coffee while Francesca maintained a fuming presence at the door.

  ‘Sit down,’ he said, without bothering to turn around and look at her. ‘You know you will eventually, anyway.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me that you had broken off your engagement with Georgina when you came around to my house?’

  Angelo turned round slowly and looked at her, arms folded. ‘Because I wanted you to make love with me thinking that I was still engaged. I wanted you to be so blinded by desire that your well-structured sense of morality would not have been able to overcome your physical craving.’