Kiss

by Jill Mansell

  ‘They are!’ Katerina started to laugh. ‘Isn’t it amazing? Apparently Gina’s divorce was finalised last week. She realised she was madly in love with Doug, and was terrified that Lucille would snatch him away . . . so she proposed to him in the office the very next morning. Oh Simon, it’s so funny and so sweet, they’re going around like a couple of moonstruck teenagers!’

  The trouble with Kat, thought Simon with a trace of exasperation, was that she never seemed to regard herself as a teenager. And what was so funny, after all, about being moonstruck? He’d been crazy about her for years.

  ‘So, when’s the wedding?’ he said, above the crackle of interference on the line.

  ‘That’s what I’m ringing about. It’s fixed for next weekend, and you’re invited. You will be able to come, won’t you?’ Katerina paused, then added fretfully, ‘Who is Claire?’

  ‘I told you, nobody. And of course I’ll come.’

  ‘For the whole weekend?’

  He grinned. ‘Yeah, all right. I suppose I can manage that. I’ll get to your house at around six on Friday evening. Look, I have to go now . . . we’re on our way out to a party. Bye, Kat.’

  Replacing the receiver with an air of triumph, he pushed up the sleeves of his crumpled rugby shirt and rejoined the poker game currently in progress at the kitchen table. His two flatmates raised quizzical eyebrows as he shuffled, then rapidly dealt the cards.

  ‘What party’s this then?’ said Kenny Bishop, pinching the last digestive biscuit.

  ‘And who the bloody hell,’ demanded Jeff Seale, ‘is Claire?’

  Izzy, amazed and delighted by the news and happily taking full credit for having introduced Gina and Doug in the first place, had insisted upon being allowed to pay for the reception.

  Gina almost fainted when she realised how much it was all going to cost.

  ‘We can’t let you do that,’ she protested, horrified. ‘Izzy, no! All we were planning to do was take over the private dining room at Cino’s restaurant in Kensington. We’d all have a wonderful meal and nobody would need to go bankrupt. Why can’t we just go there?’

  ‘Because if I don’t spend my money on important things like wedding receptions,’ replied Izzy firmly, ‘I’ll only fritter it away on silly inessentials like sunbeds and tax demands.’

  ‘It looks gorgeous,’ said Gina longingly, clutching the glossy brochure. ‘But it’s awfully extravagant.’

  ‘So am I.’ Izzy grinned. ‘And for heaven’s sake stop arguing. It’s too late now, anyway. I’ve booked it.’

  ‘Gosh.’ Gina squirmed with gratitude and pleasure. Her eyes bright, she added, ‘And I’m phoning Sam tonight to see if he can come to the wedding. Just wait until he hears about this.’

  For Izzy, who had wanted so desperately to be looking her best when she saw Sam again for the first time in three months, the almost inaudible pop of the button breaking free at her waist was the final insult.

  Her heart was in her mouth as he made his way across the Register Office’s crowded waiting room towards her.

  This is unfair, she thought miserably. Sam, of course, was immaculately dressed in a dark suit and white shirt. Tall, handsome and still possessing that indefinable charisma which marked him out from other men - and which other women found so hard to resist - he had never looked better. New York, and the love of a younger woman, evidently suited him. Izzy, wishing that she could melt into the wall behind her, tried to take comfort from the fact that at least he hadn’t brought her along with him, but somehow even that didn’t help.

  ‘Hallo, Izzy.’ His brief, polite smile didn’t reach his eyes. ‘You’re looking . . .’ He hesitated. Izzy, who knew exactly how she was looking, winced.

  ‘Wet,’ she supplied flippantly, deciding that it was the only way to play it. With a nod in the direction of the window, at the torrential rain outside, she went on, ‘It was sunny when we left the house, so I didn’t even bring a coat, let alone an umbrella. Kat was furious with me . . . she spent thirty minutes putting my hair up this morning and by the time we arrived here I looked like a half-drowned rat, so it all had to come down again. And I managed to ladder a stocking as I was getting out of the car,’ she concluded defiantly, before he had a chance to point it out to her himself. ‘So all in all, I’m a complete mess.’

  ‘I was going to say you were looking well,’ observed Sam mildly. ‘But if you’d rather I didn’t . . .’

  When people said, ‘well’, in Izzy’s experience, they almost invariably meant fat. Horribly conscious of the fact that she had, in the past fortnight, put on almost half a stone and praying that he wouldn’t spot the popped-off skirt button at her feet, she sucked in her stomach and hurriedly changed the subject.

  ‘Did Kat tell you she’d got top grades in her exams and been offered a place at medical school?’

  Sam nodded. ‘You must be very proud of her.’

  ‘And Gina . . . what about Gina?’ Izzy feverishly rattled on. ‘Can you believe she and Doug are actually getting married?’

  ‘These things do happen,’ he observed, his tone dry.

  ‘Oh, you don’t know about Jericho, either! He’s—’

  Sam, interrupting her in mid-flow, placed a hand briefly on the damp velvet sleeve of her jacket. ‘The registrar’s calling us in now. We’d better not keep him waiting.You’ll have to tell me about Jericho later.’

  ‘Right.’ Flustered by his obvious lack of interest, Izzy pushed her fingers through her still-damp hair. ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘And Izzy . . .’

  ‘Yes?’

  The thickly lashed grey eyes remained absolutely expressionless. ‘There’s a pearl button on the floor by your left foot. I think it must belong to you.’

  The reception, held at the Laugharne Hotel in Mayfair, was a splendid affair. Gina, looking more radiant than ever since becoming Mrs Douglas Steadman two hours earlier, threw her arms around Izzy and whispered, ‘This is the happiest day of my life. And none of it would have happened if it hadn’t been for you.’

  ‘It was nothing,’ quipped Izzy. Away from Sam, it was at least easier to behave normally. ‘I just happened to be riding my motor bike down the right street at the right time . . .’

  ‘And that’s not all,’ Vivienne chimed in. ‘Think about it . . . if she hadn’t invited me to that party at Tash Janssen’s place, I would never have met Terry.’ Rolling her emerald eyes in soulful fashion, she tightened her grip on his hand. ‘And I would’ve spent the rest of my life a miserable spinster.’

  ‘Like me, you mean,’ Izzy suggested with a wry smile. ‘Oh yes, you’re a fine example of a miserable spinster,’ drawled Vivienne. ‘On our way here we passed an advertising hoarding with your picture plastered all over it, promoting the new album. It said, “Experience Izzy Van Asch’s Kiss,” and someone had sprayed underneath it, “Yes please.” ’

  ‘I’m still a spinster.’ For a terrible moment, tears pricked her eyelids.

  ‘Bullshit,’ Vivienne declared fondly. ‘You could have any man you wanted.’ Then, turning to Terry and planting a noisy, fuchsia-pink kiss on his cheek, she added, ‘Except, of course, this one.’

  ‘Who’s Claire?’ demanded Katerina. Simon, forking up smoked salmon and deciding that it definitely had the edge on tinned, hid his smile.

  ‘You keep asking me that,’ he complained good-naturedly. ‘And I keep telling you, she’s nobody.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because she must be your girlfriend.’

  ‘And if she is?’ Cocking his head to one side, he studied her beautiful, mutinous profile. ‘Would you be jealous?’

  Katerina wasn’t eating. Having demolished a bread roll with agitated fingers, she was now reduced to rolling the dough into pellets.

  ‘Of course I’d be bloody jealous,’ she muttered, her cheeks burning with shame. ‘I don’t even know her, and I hate her.’

  Bingo, thought Simon, breaking into a grin. Putting
down his fork, he took her trembling hand in his and said, ‘In that case, maybe it’s just as well she really doesn’t exist.’

  It was weak and pathetic of her, Izzy knew, but after four solid hours of being relentlessly cheerful she needed a break. Her mouth ached from smiling, her new high heels pinched like crab claws and her stupid skirt - even without its button - was still far too tight. It was hard work socializing without the aid of champagne and harder still avoiding Sam without making the distance between them seem obvious. Other people’s happiness, Izzy ruefully concluded, wasn’t catching at all. It was making her downright miserable.

  Chapter 62

  ‘What are you doing in here?’

  Sam’s voice made her jump. Izzy, who had been curled up in the corner of a Wedgwood-blue sofa in the otherwise deserted hotel sitting-room for the last twenty minutes, felt her stomach do its familiar ungainly flip-flop.

  Avoiding you of course, she thought. But since she couldn’t very well say so, she replied shortly, ‘Nothing. Having a rest.’

  With an inward sigh, Sam realised that this wasn’t going to be easy. Discussing anything of any real importance with Izzy had never been easy and the signals she was sending out at this moment were unpromising to say the least.

  But he was damned if he was going to give up without having even tried. Not when he’d come this far . . .

  ‘You haven’t told me about Jericho,’ he reminded her, nudging her feet out of the way and making himself comfortable on the sofa next to her.

  Oh God, thought Izzy, close to despair, not more polite conversation.

  ‘It isn’t exactly the most riveting gossip in the world,’ she said with a dismissive shrug. ‘He got some poor bitch pregnant, that’s all. She gave birth to three puppies last week.’

  ‘Hmm. It sounded more riveting the way Katerina told it.’

  Izzy glared at him. ‘If you already knew, why did you bother to ask me?’

  ‘Well, we’ve already discussed the weather . . .’

  He was almost-but-not-quite smiling. Realizing that he was making fun of her, she snapped back, ‘Don’t patronize me.’

  ‘Don’t sulk then,’ Sam replied easily. ‘Izzy, look. It doesn’t have to be like this. I thought we were supposed to be friends, at least.’

  The more reasonable he was, the more she hated it. Childishly, she said, ‘Real friends send Christmas cards.’

  He started to laugh. ‘You didn’t send me one.’

  ‘Only because you didn’t send me one first.’

  ‘Izzy, is that really what this is all about?’ Rising to his feet, taking out his wallet, he said, ‘Would you like me to go out to the shops and buy you a Christmas card now?’

  ‘Oh, shut up!’ she howled, determined not to smile. He had always been able to do this to her and she needed so badly to remain in control . . .

  But Sam had crossed to the mantelpiece, upon which was stacked a sheaf of the glossy brochures extolling the delights of the Laugharne Hotel. Removing the top from his pen he sat down beside her once more, wrote ‘Happy Christmas, Izzy’ across the front of one of the brochures, then opened it up and scrawled on the inside page, ‘With all my love, Sam.’ ‘There,’ he said, his expression deadpan once more. ‘Better?’

  But it wasn’t better. Izzy, awash with jealousy and realizing that she was once again in danger of bursting into tears, muttered, ‘You can’t put that. You mustn’t put “all my love”. What would your girlfriend think?’

  ‘My girlfriend.’ Sam paused, giving the matter some thought. Then he said, ‘What girlfriend?’

  Izzy flushed. She was sailing close to the wind now, but the urge to say it . . . and the masochistic need to know what Miss America was really like . . . was irresistible.

  ‘I’d heard you’d got one,’ she said, her heart hammering against her ribs, but her tone carefully casual. ‘Is she nice?’

  But Sam no longer appeared to be listening. Instead, having removed the impromptu greetings card from Izzy’s grasp, he was scrawling an additional line below his name.

  Barely able to contain her impatience, Izzy repeated, ‘Sam. Is she nice?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘You know damn well who!’

  He sighed and handed her the card. ‘I can’t imagine where you’ve been getting this highly dubious information from, but there is no girlfriend. If you must know, I’ve been shamefully celibate for the last three months. Now, come on, open your Christmas card and read the last line.’

  It said, ‘PS Why don’t you stop arguing and just say you’ll marry me?’

  The words swam on the page as Izzy’s eyes filled with tears, but this time she made no effort to hold them back. Sam was telling her everything she’d wanted to hear. The trouble was, he was lying . . .

  ‘I spoke to her on the phone,’ she said, her voice barely above a whisper. ‘I phoned you and she was there at your apartment. Sam, I realise that she never did pass on the message for you to ring me back, so you can’t be blamed for that. But the second time I phoned, you were there in bed with her. The two of you were . . . together. So please don’t try and pretend you’ve been celibate for three months because I heard you . . . and I can’t bear the fact that you’re telling me lies!’

  Sam was silent for several seconds. Finally, he said, ‘Which number did you ring?’

  ‘Oh, shut up,’ wailed Izzy. ‘It was your number.’

  He reeled it off. When she nodded - because for some ridiculous reason it had remained indelibly imprinted on her mind - he smiled.

  ‘That’s where I used to live,’ said Sam gently. ‘I sold it eight weeks ago. To a TV producer called Sam Hirsch.’

  Izzy stopped crying. She stopped breathing. She couldn’t remember how to breathe . . . When she was able to speak, she said, ‘Are you sure?’

  His dark eyebrows lifted. ‘Well, I’m fairly sure. And I used the money from the sale of the apartment to pay off the debts at the club . . . But if you wanted to double-check, you could always phone the Hirsches and ask them yourself.’

  Every detail of the nightmare thirty-hour trip to New York was hurtling through Izzy’s mind: sixteen hours of flying, that beastly cab driver, the sheer torture of sitting in her hotel room waiting for the phone to ring, and then the ensuing anguish . . .

  ‘Oh, Sam,’ she said weakly, gazing at him in exasperation, ‘why didn’t you tell anyone you’d moved?’

  ‘I did,’ he replied with mock indignation. ‘When I sent Gina a Christmas card I gave her my new number and address. All you had to do was ask her.’

  ‘I flew all that way for nothing.’

  ‘You mean you were in NewYork when you called me?’

  Izzy closed her eyes for a moment, unable to believe this was really happening. She nodded.

  ‘Well, this is encouraging news.’ Intrigued, Sam said, ‘Does this mean you actually wanted to see me?’

  ‘Maybe.’ Her tone was cautious, but the corners of her mouth were beginning to twitch. ‘Oh bloody hell, Sam! Do I have to spell it out? Yes, I flew to New York because I wanted to see you and managed to make a complete idiot of myself in the process. There, I’ve said it. Are you happy now?’

  ‘Maybe,’ he mimicked gently, grinning and pulling her at long last into his arms. ‘Although I’ll be a lot happier when you’ve said you’ll marry me.’

  Izzy’s lower lip was starting to tremble again. He kissed it, very briefly, then drew back and gazed into her brown eyes, his expression this time deadly serious.

  ‘I mean it, Izzy. I’ve had three months to think about it, and it’s the only answer. I don’t want anybody else. I can’t imagine ever wanting anyone else. I know now you were trying to be sensible when you told me I’d want children of my own, but that’s simply no longer an issue. I know I’d rather be married to you and not have children, than marry somebody else and . . .’ He shrugged, dismissing the argument. ‘Well, it would be totally pointless.’

  ‘Oh.’ Suffused with love, Izzy cl
ung to him. In a moment, when she was able to think coherently once more, she would break the news to him that Mother Nature had decreed a change of plan.

  But Sam’s arms, around her waist, were making a voyage of discovery of their own.

  ‘Your zip’s undone,’ he said, looking perplexed and glancing down at her short, topaz-yellow velvet skirt. ‘What’s the matter, are you ill?’

  ‘We . . . ll,’ Izzy began, but at that moment the door to the blue-and-white sitting room flew open.