by Lily Harlem
I couldn’t imagine going into work and not seeing Derek there. Not having him lead meetings in his firm but gentle manner. Who else would make the effort to bring in cakes and fizz when it was someone’s birthday? Who else would be so understanding about the need for an occasional “duvet day” when the weather was horrid and Monday morning just too much to handle?
“Derek, Derek, how are you? So glad you made it through the blasted weather.”
Ray Burgess, owner of Safe as Houses, stepped up and pressed his hand onto Derek’s shoulder.
“Hi, Ray,” Derek said, smiling.
“And who is this?” Ray turned to me. He was the same age as Derek, with thinning hair scraped back over his balding crown. He too, was pot-bellied and his tie had pictures of tiny houses on it. On the roof of each house a mini LED flashed like one of our little alarm boxes.
“You must remember Ashley Jones,” Derek said. “She joined us here last year.”
Ray’s gaze slid down my body, over my chest, my hips and to my shoes. “No, I can’t recall that we had the pleasure of being introduced,” he said, returning his gaze to my face just before I was weirded out by his gawp.
“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Burgess.” I remembered us being introduced the year before. But what was the point in arguing? I clearly hadn’t been memorable.
He smiled and shook my hand, wrapped it entirely in his hot, slightly damp one.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” a loud voice boomed from the doorway right behind us. “Would you all please take your seats for dinner?”
Gratefully I extracted my fingers from Ray’s and turned. The head waiter was gesturing toward the restaurant opposite the bar.
“Come on,” Derek said to me. “Let’s go find some seats.”
“I want you to sit at my table,” Ray said to Derek. “I need to pick your brains about a few things before you-know-what.” He winked exaggeratedly.
Derek nodded. “Sure thing,” he said, stepping away from me with an apologetic smile.
The ripple of nerves in my chest turned into a wave of panic. If Derek was sitting next to Ray then who would I sit next to? I moved with the crowd into the restaurant and glanced at Rachel—she was nice, perhaps I could sit with her. But she was laughing and linking arms with Jeremy, the team leader from Cheltenham branch. My eyes searched the room for someone else familiar. Chairs were being scraped on the floor and the hum of conversation increased as people settled themselves at the dozen or so large, round tables.
I gulped back the last of my champagne. No one else seemed to have a moment’s hesitation about where to sit. For them it was like putting on a pair of slippers or making a cup of tea. Effortless.
For me the urge to run, to turn and flee, was like a primitive instinct. Why the hell was I here? I should just go to my room, read about Tobias’ kinky wedding night. Find out what it would be like to be tied to the bridge of a yacht and have a sexy millionaire squeeze orgasm after orgasm from me.
I fiddled with the heart pendant resting just below the hollow of my neck. Run or stay? Run or stay? There were hardly any unclaimed seats left. My gaze scanned the room, flicking over the large plumes of Christmas flowers standing centrally on each table and the tinsel strung around the picture rails.
Suddenly I spotted a free seat at Rachel’s table, two places away from her. I remembered all my heroines. None of them would turn and run from a room of people when there was a free seat.
Bracing myself, I tilted my chin and stepped toward the table, praying that no one would beat me to it. My hips rolled as I walked and the warmth of the room settled on the exposed upper mounds of my breasts. As I approached the table, the person who would be sitting between Rachel and me turned and looked straight at me.
My heart stuttered. It was Shane Galloway. The delectable Shane Galloway who’d won the overall most productive salesman of the year three years in a row. I’d admired him from afar last year and watched him dance after the meal with Ray’s wife Rose. I gulped. I was offering myself up for a mealtime conversation with a guy so out of my league he might as well live on Mars.
Shane was gorgeous in a rock-star, devil-may-care kind of way. He had jet-black hair that just touched the top of his white collar, the skin on his face was pale and his brows dark and heavy. There was a sprinkle of stubble on his chin and above his top lip. Already he’d loosened his navy-blue tie and undone the first button of his shirt.
I kept putting one foot in front of the other. Felt and saw his gaze slide down my body. His attention hovered for a moment on my rolling hips before rising to my face once more. Then he was standing, standing and reaching for the chair I’d planned on claiming.
Oh god. It was already taken?
He’d intended on sitting next to someone else? He didn’t want me to sit there. He was going to move it. I was going to have to turn away.
I hesitated. Looked into his dark eyes and held my breath.
“Here,” he said in a smooth voice, tilting the left side of his mouth into a smile. “Allow me.”
If I’d thought the rush of nerves earlier was intense then this was like a tsunami. Shane Galloway actually wanted to sit next to me? Wow, the power of a red dress, fishnet stockings and killer heels.
I stretched my glossy lips into a matching smile and prayed I didn’t look as shaky as I felt. “Thanks,” I said, stepping up to the table.
He touched the chair against the back of my knees. I sat, knotted my fingers in my lap and crossed my ankles.
“Hi, Ashley,” Rachel said, leaning forward as Shane sat his tall frame back down. “You look…er…really well.” Her blue eyes were wide behind her spectacles as she absorbed my new look. “Have you been on holiday or something?”
“Er, no, no holiday.”
Everyone at the table turned to me. Even a young, pimpled guy opposite was peering around the tall floral centerpiece to stare.
“How are you, Rachel?” I asked, trying to keep my voice casual.
“Fabulous, thanks and this is great, isn’t it? They always do such a lovely job at The Fenchurch.”
I nodded and reached for the slim glass of water a waiter set before me.
“Have you two met before?” Rachel asked, flicking her gaze between Shane and me.
“No,” Shane answered, smiling my way. “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.” His lips looked soft and sensual, his top left tooth crooked by a millimeter over the right one and his eyes sparkled as though full of sin. Dark, naughty, expert sin. The sort of sin bad-boy pirates and dukes intent on satisfaction had in their eyes.
“Ashley,” I said, unknotting my fingers and holding out my hand. “Ashley Jones. I’m from the Chelsea branch.”
He took my hand. Curled big, warm fingers around mine and squeezed gently. “Shane Galloway, Huddersfield branch. It’s lovely to meet you, Ashley.”
A snake of sensation washed up my arm, ran across my shoulder and settled in my chest. I pulled in a breath and was treated to a lungful of his light aftershave. He tipped his head slightly as he carried on staring into my eyes. He pulled in a deep breath too.
“I, er, it’s a pleasure to meet you as well.” I extracted my hand and dragged my gaze from his. If I wasn’t careful I could almost fool myself into thinking he was attracted to me. I wasn’t an expert in this sort of thing but in my books, lingering handshakes, prolonged eye contact and inhaling perfume were all connected to human attraction.
“So, congratulations,” he said, reaching for a seeded bread roll.
“For what?” I asked, watching him tear the roll in half. His fingernails were neat and perfectly square. He had a faint line on his left ring finger.
“For being employee of the year at your branch,” he said, smearing a thick wedge of butter onto his roll.
“Oh, yes, that. And you too.” I reached for my own roll although I suddenly didn’t feel hungry. There was a heaviness in the pit of my stomach like hunger but I didn’t think food would sate it. A quiet read of
Pounding Without Sound would fill the gap. Marie and Travis getting it on together in the restroom of a Boeing 747 was always a good read when I needed something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Or rather, I needed to put my finger on.
“Yeah,” he said. “Personally I didn’t sell quite as much as last year because I’ve been a bit distracted.” He bit into his roll.
“Oh,” I said. “Why is that?”
He swallowed. “It’s just been a crap year.” He leaned back and his soft suit jacket touched my bare shoulder. “What with one thing and another.”
“Like what?” I didn’t move away from the warm, slightly scratchy touch of his suit. It felt nice, it felt up close and personal.
He turned to me and lowered his voice. “I got divorced in March and took an unpaid month off to visit a mate in Australia, and then in September, I started a part-time university course in marketing, which has taken me out of the office one day a week.” He smiled. “Still, hopefully the course will make me even more productive in the future. It’s already given me some great ideas.”
“Well, you’ve still been top seller in Huddersfield despite taking time off and being on a four-day week.”
A waiter set bowls of steaming creamy soup in front of us.
“Yes, I came joint with Rachel, that’s why we’re both here.”
I glanced at Rachel chatting animatedly to Jeremy.
“And I’m sorry about the divorce,” I said. “It must have been tough.”
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “We’d only been married eighteen months. But it seemed she preferred my best friend to me so what could I do?” He bent his head over his bowl and scooped up a spoonful of soup.
I watched the way he blew gently on the liquid before opening his mouth. A small dent appeared in his cheek, then his Adam’s apple bobbed low as he swallowed. How could anyone choose someone else over him? Not only was he drop-dead gorgeous, he was charming, successful and right up there with Tobias and Bret and all the others in my books. Plus, I’d bet my right arm he’d know just what to do in the bedroom. I’d bet those square fingers knew which buttons to press and that mouth knew just how and where to kiss. His ex-wife was a fool. But her loss was my gain, because here I was, little mousy Ashley, sitting next to hunky, newly single Shane Galloway.
He glanced at me. “I know what you’re thinking,” he said.
I bet you don’t.
“What?” I asked, taking a sip of my own rich soup and thoroughly enjoying a tingle of desire for a real man instead of a fictitious one for a change.
“How could I not have seen it coming?” he said.
“Did you?”
“No, not at all. Although looking back the signs were there. Hell, they both disappeared for twenty-five minutes at our wedding reception.”
I gave a sympathetic frown. “Do you think they were…at it?”
“I don’t think, I know. She threw the information at me in an argument last Christmas. They’d been shagging in the ladies’ toilet for heaven’s sake.” His brown eyes captured mine and he sighed. “I’m sorry, Ashley. I don’t normally meet someone and start boring them with this.”
I shrugged. “It’s good to talk about bad stuff that’s happened. It gets it off your chest.”
“Yeah, but it’s history, I guess with the New Year coming up it makes you think of all that’s happened, but now I’m looking forward to starting afresh.”
“Is that what you’re going to do?”
“I’ve already done it. Since I got home from Oz I’ve been getting my teeth back into life.” He smiled broadly. “I know I’ve got a good career if I just keep working hard and I wish Mandy and Jared well. No hard feelings, no bitterness, because that would just drag me down.”
“Very sensible, and of course you wouldn’t want to be dragged down any longer.” I drew my gaze from his face, took another sip of my soup, and let the creamy potato coat my tongue and warm my throat. I forced myself not to think of all the dragging down I’d like him to do to me. Had we been on The Lost Soul, he a pirate and me a willing wench, he could have dragged down my garter and petticoats, my pantaloons and corset all day, every day until we reached shore.
“And what about you, Ashley?” His gaze settled on my mouth. I licked my lips and hoped I didn’t have a sprig of stray herb stuck in my gloss. “What are you hoping for next year?” He glanced at my hands, the way I had his. Was he checking for a wedding ring? Surely not.
“Mmm, well I don’t know really.” I could hardly tell him that losing my virginity was top of my to-do list. That finding a hot hunk to screw me silly was becoming increasingly pressing.
“Are you going for any promotions at Safe as Houses?”
“No, I’m happy with what I’m doing. I like chatting to customers and not having to take any of the work home with me at night. When I go out the office door, my time and my mind are my own.”
“Very sensible,” he said, taking a sip of the wine the waiters had just served. As he set the glass down his gaze strayed a little farther from my mouth, floated over my neck and into the hollow of my throat. “I like your necklace.”
“Thanks.” Instinctively I pressed my finger to it. “It was a present.”
“From your boyfriend?”
“No, no boyfriend. My parents gave me it as a birthday present a few years back.”
“It’s very pretty,” he said, still looking at it. “Just like you.”
My chest tightened. My breath hitched and a wave of intense heat spread up to my cheekbones. He’d just called me pretty. No guy had ever said that to me before. I placed my spoon down and it clattered against my bowl.
“I’m sorry,” he said, leaning back as a waiter gathered plates. “Not very smooth of me, I know.” He shrugged. “I’m kinda out of the game at the moment, guess I’ve lost my touch and subtlety never was my strong point.”
I opened my mouth to speak but no words came out.
“Have you finished, miss?” a waiter asked over my right shoulder.
I nodded vigorously.
The waiter cleared away and Shane reached and grabbed a Christmas cracker. “Here. Pull this with me.”
His action sparked the rest of the table reaching for their crackers and I was glad of the deflected attention from my blush. Bangs, cries of surprise and hoots from wheezers rang out. I clutched the crinkled end of the gold cracker Shane offered and braced.
We both pulled and it split in two with a loud crack. My chest wobbled as I laughed. It surprised me, I laughed harder and my chest wobbled some more. Shane chuckled and for the briefest of seconds his glance hit my quivering breasts.
“Excellent,” he said, scooping up our loot from the starched-white tablecloth. “A tiny torch for when the lights go out later.” He flicked it to life and flashed the weak beam onto the palm of his broad hand.
“And the joke?” I said, reaching for the curl of white paper, “is…” I paused. It wasn’t a joke at all. It was a proverb.
“What is it?” Shane asked, leaning in close again.
“The things that are really for thee, gravitate to thee,” I said over the squeals and cracks coming from other tables.
“Very appropriate,” he said with a smile, taking it.
“What do you mean?”
He folded it in half and poked it into his inside breast pocket. “I think I’ve come up with enough cheesy lines for the first course, don’t you?”
The main meal was traditional turkey with all the trimmings followed by Christmas pudding and brandy sauce. Shane and I chatted about our Safe as Houses colleagues and compared offices, commutes and parking complaints, then the conversation moved on to movies. I read more than I watched but still offered up a couple of the year’s big releases to discuss. It seemed Shane was a keen cinemagoer and preferred the big screen to sitting at home. “Better appreciation of the cinematography,” he said seriously.
I told him about the holiday I’d taken to Egypt in the summer with my parents—the mi
ghty pyramids and the flies that had eaten me alive. He kept the whole table entertained with a story about a snake in his boot in the outback, and how he and his friend had tempted it out with raw sausage and captured it in a net.
I watched him talking and thought how perfectly masculine the texture of his skin looked—just the right amount of stubble over an angled jawline. I rubbed my fingertips together in my lap and wondered what his cheek would feel like to touch. What it would be like pressed against mine. He turned to me and smiled as he stretched his arms wide to show the length of the snake. I imagined his sharply stubbled chin on my chest, on my stomach, on the inside of my thighs. I squeezed my legs together as a tiny tremor buzzed in my pelvis. In The Barmaid’s Brew, Gray had tormented Daisy with the roughness of his cheek on her inner thigh, touching and scratching until she’d begged for more, demanded that he go higher and take her intimate flesh into his mouth.
A sudden loud clinking snapped my attention away from the erotic image and I turned to see Ray standing two tables away, banging his spoon against his glass.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” he boomed. The room fell silent. “Thank you all so much for coming tonight despite the atrocious weather conditions, it really is very much appreciated.”
“All this for free, no chance I was missing it,” a heckler behind me shouted.
A rumble of laughter and hear, hear echoed around as Ray held up his glass. “I can assure you it’s not free for me.” He laughed. “But I’m not complaining, you guys have once again exceeded all my expectations with the way you throw your efforts and your skills into making Safe as Houses the biggest, most reliable, most recommended security company in the country.”
A cheer rang out and several people hooted on paper trumpets. I looked back at Shane. I couldn’t help it. He was like a magnet, and an image of us in the same position as Daisy and Gray had suddenly appeared in my mind’s eye.
“And,” Ray said, “before the disco begins next door and we dance off those calories, I would just like you all to raise a glass to my very dear friend and colleague, Derek Finlay, who is retiring in the New Year.” He turned to Derek who was sitting beside him. “You will be sadly missed but I know you have a very busy and very exciting retirement planned and I wish you all the best.”