He put his palm over his heart, the way he had that night when he proposed, before she’d found herself mired in this strange deal. ‘I promise to be completely honest. I will never lie to you, Victoria.’
‘Nor I to you.’ But there were some things she didn’t even need to bring up with him, things that would stay locked inside her for ever.
‘Good, glad we’re on the same page,’ he said with a soft smile, looking at the pen poised in her hand. ‘And you’re really going to take notes?’
She breathed out. ‘If I don’t write things down, I’ll forget. I need to revise and practise, so I don’t mess up.’
‘It’s not an exam. Stop stressing.’ He peered more closely at the first page in her book. ‘What’s that?’
‘Nothing.’ She snapped the notebook closed and put it face down on the table. She hadn’t even realized she’d drawn anything. ‘Just random doodles.’
Frowning playfully, he picked the book up and opened at the first page. ‘Very accomplished doodles. It looks familiar. Is it… wait… I know, it’s that handrail in the new store… the birds and the entwined branches.’
‘Oh? Is it?’ She couldn’t remember doing it, couldn’t imagine why she’d chosen to draw that particular thing, other than that it had been such a lovely surprise to uncover it and show it to Oliver.
‘It’s very good.’
She smiled, unused to getting compliments and not knowing what to do with them, other than wear them as a blush. Her body obliged. ‘I did art and design at university, if I couldn’t draw a bird on a tree they’d have thrown me out.’
‘It’s good good, Victoria.’
‘Thank you. I graduated top of my class. Do you draw? Paint? Hobbies?’ She looked at his hands. Long, strong fingers.
He shrugged. ‘I used to ski and play rugby. Now I run. At least I did. Work is all-encompassing.’
‘You need to take time out, enjoy life outside of the office.’
‘Sure. I’ll put in my diary for… oh, 2045.’ He shook his head with a wry smile. ‘Not going to happen.’
‘Then you’ll work yourself into an early grave.’ As soon as the words came out she regretted them. She didn’t know what was ailing his dad, but alluding to anything like that was insensitive. Her gut tightened. ‘I didn’t mean – I’m sorry.’
‘It’s OK. I know you wouldn’t mean it. And maybe he is sick from working too hard. It’s heart failure… heart stuff is stress-related, right?’
‘I don’t know, but I wish I could take back what I said.’ She slipped her hand over his and patted his skin. Realized what she was doing and quickly drew it back. But not before he caught her fingers in his. Warmth spread across her hand and when she looked up into his eyes she saw the pain pushed out by something a lot like desire. ‘Victoria—’
She didn’t know what he was going to say, she didn’t want to hear it. Didn’t want to be drawn into anything more personal, anything that would hurt. Shaking her hand free she grabbed the notebook again and opened her notes. ‘So, I googled you.’
‘Oh dear.’ He paused as the waiter brought their order over. ‘What did you find out?’
‘That you have a freaking Wikipedia page!’
‘Doesn’t everyone?’ His wide eyes told her he was joking.
She laughed at the thought of anyone being interested enough in her life to put it on the internet. ‘As if. What would mine say? Victoria Scott… um… not much happened and then not much happened again.’
Aziz arrived with the food, interrupting the conversation briefly. Victoria slid her notebook back into her bag.
‘Ah, but imagine if your page said’ – Oliver raised his hand and drew an arc in the air – ‘world-famous designer to the stars.’
‘I suppose dreams are free.’
‘It could become a reality.’
She took a bite of the chicken and groaned at the deliciousness. This was real. This little restaurant with Formica tables and wonky pictures of the Taj Mahal on flocked wallpaper. Not being world-famous. ‘If I won the lottery, maybe. I could afford to give up work to focus on my collections. Not everyone has the same opportunities you have had.’
‘This is the best curry I’ve had in a long time.’ He shook his head, groaning with her at the spicy heat in the food. ‘Not everyone has the same talent you have.’
‘You haven’t seen my designs.’
‘But I’ve witnessed your passion, I’ve seen your doodles. If your clothes are as detailed as that bird then I’m very impressed.’
‘Sadly, impressed doesn’t pay the rent.’ She stopped there because she didn’t want him to think she was a charity case or hinting at needing money. She was perfectly OK with the trajectory her career was on, it was just taking more time than she’d anticipated after the last setback. But she’d get there.
‘OK… back to business. Let me remember: you went to Harrow, then up to Oxford, graduated with a first in economics. Very impressive by the way. You played rugby for your college, got selected for England under nineteens. You won player of the year three years in a row. Even more impressive.’ She didn’t mention Tatler’s profile of him as one of UK’s most eligible bachelors, and the fact his father made the Sunday Times Rich List, but only at number twenty-seven. Twenty-freaking-seven.
And here she was with him, in her favourite local Indian restaurant, slurping a beer and eating the best chicken tikka masala in London. ‘Also, that you were recently responsible for opening a Russell & Co in Paris and that the elegant and sublime Clarissa Maguire was seen on your arm a few weeks ago with speculation that you’re a couple and settling down. I’m sure your mother would have read that too.’
‘Undoubtedly.’ He grimaced. ‘She likes to keep abreast of all my romantic encounters, unfortunately.’
‘Which makes things a bit sticky. I can pretend to be lots of things, but I can’t pretend to be half a foot taller, with different coloured eyes, and a champion ballroom dancer. I’m not sure I have two left feet but they’re certainly not right.’
‘I don’t want you to pretend to be anyone but yourself. Mum is used to media reports of me being seen with different women. That’s why being my fiancée rather than my girlfriend gives her a stronger message. It’s all part of the plan.’
A plan she was starting to regret agreeing to. ‘How does it feel to be under the glare of the media spotlight all the time?’
‘Restricting. I envy you the freedom to decide who you want to be and what you want to do.’
‘Could you just tell them that you don’t want to take the helm of Russell & Co?’
He put down his fork. ‘And risk making my father work harder to the detriment of his health? No. Not right now. Maybe in a few years. Maybe never.’
‘So, you’re trapped?’
He frowned. ‘It’s an honour and a privilege to have a job like mine.’
‘Tell that to your face.’ She laughed at the way his mouth formed a circle and his nose crinkled. ‘You look as if you’ve just eaten a lemon.’
‘It’s the chilli. This is hot.’ He laughed with her, but they both knew he was lying. ‘You really don’t care about the job or the money, do you, Victoria?’
‘Not if it makes you unhappy. Life is too short to do things you don’t want to do.’
‘How did you get so philosophical?’
‘I learnt a few hard lessons at a young age.’ Fighting to survive had made her rethink what she wanted out of life. But being responsible for horrific injuries to her friends made her re-evaluate her attitudes, her actions. Everything.
For a while guilt had prevented her from moving forward but her friends had rallied round and told her she hadn’t been to blame for the accident and to live the life the dead driver from the other car wasn’t able to. But Oliver didn’t need to know that.
The conversation was veering too close to her personal life again and she was wondering how to steer it away, but luckily his phone beeped and distracted him. He pulled it out
of his pocket and shook his head and cursed. ‘Damn.’
‘Trouble?’
With another exasperated shake of his head Oliver ground out, ‘Just Andrew. That’s always trouble. I left him in charge of a simple job, but he can’t manage even that… and somehow that’s my problem.’ He looked bleakly at the phone screen and exhaled roughly. ‘The buck stops with me. It is my problem.’
‘You need to go.’
He nodded, scraping his chair back. ‘I’m sorry…’
‘Business is business. Just like this is. Let’s call this meeting to a close.’ She tried to keep her tone as professional as she could, given the image of him in her bed still had her body prickling with nervous, excited energy. ‘We have a few work-ons for next time. I can email you some questions through if you like?’
‘Sure thing. How do you think we’ve done tonight?’
She’d learnt that she was more attracted to him than she’d planned to be. That he had a core that was hard to penetrate, but she’d seen a chink of it when he talked about his father. That his arms around her felt good. Not to mention his scent being delicious and intoxicating. That she was at a distinct risk of liking him more than she should.
She watched as he wiped his hands on a napkin and then put it on the table. ‘I now know you’re left-handed and we didn’t even talk about that. But I don’t think we’re much closer to being able to pull this off. I don’t know where you live. What you do on your days off… what your favourite colour is… there’s still a lot of ground to cover.’
‘We have two weeks. That’s plenty of time to get to know each other.’ He pulled out his wallet and turned towards the counter. ‘Trust me, I’ve had relationships shorter than that.’
‘That, Mr Fifty Years Is A Long Time, I can totally believe.’ She followed him to pay the bill, insisted they split it and he argued but she won, and then they walked out into the cold night.
Little flakes of snow whirled around them and she caught some in her palm. ‘Wow. It’s snowing? In November? Isn’t that a bit early?’
‘For London, yes. It’s freezing. Here.’ He tugged his coat collar up round his neck and wrapped his scarf around her. It was soft cashmere and smelled of him. She pulled it close to her throat, inhaling and berating herself for doing so. But he smelt so good. Her stomach tugged and heated and she was shocked to feel stirrings of something she hadn’t felt in a long time.
The council had hung strings of little lights across the road waiting for the official switch on which coincided with Russell & Co’s opening day. Imagining how it would look, she grinned. ‘Christmas is coming fast and furious.’
‘And I’m running out of time.’ He suddenly looked sad, his face was pained, and she just knew he wasn’t talking about the store and that his thoughts had wandered back to his father. She wanted to squeeze his arm and tell him it’d be OK, but she couldn’t overstretch the relationship they’d agreed on and couldn’t make promises she had no right making. What if it wasn’t OK at all?
They crossed the road in silence and when they arrived back outside the bar she stopped, not knowing how to end this and not wanting her time with him to finish so soon.
‘Before I forget, my students want to meet you, to get the lowdown on what they’re meant to do on the opening day, but mainly to say thank you for the opportunity. If you’re not too busy. Sometime.’
‘Er. Sure.’ But he looked a little spooked at the prospect. ‘When’s the next class?’
‘Tomorrow. Seven o’clock. I work the early shift in the bar then teach in the evening.’
He gave a curt nod. ‘I’ll be there. Wherever there is?’
She pointed upwards. ‘My studio… also known as the master bedroom.’
‘You teach in your bedroom?’
‘It’s a studio now. I sleep in the box room. It’s just me, so I don’t need much room. And the light in there is amazing.’
‘Spending the evening in your master bedroom? That will make my mother very happy.’ He laughed, his eyes catching hers as something unspoken passed between them. Another image of them in bed slid into her brain.
‘Oliver Russell. Do not overstep.’ But before she could move he’d leaned closer and grazed a kiss on her cheek. She turned her head awkwardly at the last minute and found herself staring at his mouth.
Oh.
It was a damned fine mouth. If she moved one inch upwards on tiptoe she could press her lips to his, taste him. Feel the pressure of him against her.
No.
She closed her eyes, beating back the ache deep and low in her body that keened towards him. It felt as if there was an invisible thread tugging her closer.
She wanted to kiss him. She couldn’t. That would be madness.
But she wanted to.
She dragged her gaze away from his lips and up to his eyes. They were heavy and misted, soft with a longing that pulled at her gut. He was fighting too. Struggling to keep the right side of a line that was blurring with every second they stood here. But it didn’t make anything any better knowing that.
‘Tomorrow.’ He stepped back. Swallowed. His voice cracking with desire. ‘Excellent.’
Was it? She was beginning to think this whole mess was a huge mistake. ‘Come around seven thirty, the girls should have settled into work by then. Good luck with Andrew.’
‘I’m going to need more than luck.’ He squeezed her arm and nodded, then walked away leaving her frustrated and confused. One kiss wasn’t worth the trouble it would bring. It was blurring the edges, breaking the rules. Breaking her promise to herself. But it was the sultry promise of the touch of his hand, his skin on her cheek, his mouth – God, that mouth, that she couldn’t escape.
And now she’d invited him into her private space. They had to pretend they knew each other well enough to want to spend the rest of their lives together. They had two weeks to pull this off. They didn’t have enough time to relax into each other.
It was all moving too quickly.
Chapter Eight
OLIVER HAD BEEN IN many hostile boardrooms and negotiated complex contracts with difficult terms and conditions with equally hostile people, so God knew why his gut roiled at the thought of meeting a bunch of teenagers.
In Victoria’s space.
That was the problem, and the drawcard. It felt strangely intimate climbing the stairs to the apartment above the wine bar, the whole place smelling of her; fresh and flowery. Something quintessentially feminine. In response, his gut contracted.
There was the problem; he’d negotiated those contracts with difficult people and had never had the little hairs on his arm raise and his heart rate pick up in what he could only, frustratingly, describe as attraction. He tried to rationalize it. So, he was attracted to her? She was a beautiful woman. He could work with that. He’d worked with plenty of beautiful women before and it had been just fine.
But he’d never had a feeling in his gut like this: half apprehension, half excitement. All sensual. Worse, he’d been anticipating this all day and no matter how many times he’d tried to pull his thoughts away from her he’d found himself imagining her space. Imagining her in it. Imagining her in her bed. With him.
Even though he knew this couldn’t go anywhere – the woman was determined never to get married and it wasn’t something he was contemplating – his head was getting all carried away. He was off balance and that wasn’t something he was used to.
He knocked. No answer. Waited. Knocked again. Then pushed the unlocked front door open and was greeted with chatter ten decibels louder than he’d expected and a whole other frequency level. No wonder they hadn’t heard his rap on the door. He followed the noise down a clean white-walled corridor, glancing past a kitchen, lounge, bathroom and neat feminine box room, to the end room.
And his tight stomach plummeted. Whoa. So many women. So much noise. So much colour. It was a huge bright room that, he imagined, in daylight would get lots of light from the large bay window. There wasn’t a bed,
just shelves spilling fabric and paper and scrunched linens on every available surface. Large rolls of material were propped up against what free wall space there was and on the floor in the corner were school bags and discarded notebooks covered in drawings. He looked over at the huge wooden table dominating the middle of the room, covered with assorted linens and fabric, zips, buttons, tape, scissors and sequins. Way too many sequins.
Talk about out of his comfort zone. He groaned; out-sequinned, out-numbered and completely out of his depth.
As no one had seen him walk in he tried to make himself heard. ‘Hello?’
Nothing. No one even noticed. For someone who was used to conversations abruptly ending and everyone jumping up to greet him when he walked into a room this was unnerving. Laughing and chatting, they had their backs to him, all leaning over the table, picking up swatches of fabric, holding each up against themselves, or against… ah, not so many people; six mannequins wearing an assortment of half-finished garments.
But when Victoria’s head popped up from behind the table and she smiled at him he felt the tension slink away and simultaneously his pulse rush at the sight of her. Her hair was piled up on top of her head with loose tendrils framing her face. She was wearing a pale pink jumper and cream cropped-at-the-ankle trousers that covered her curves like a dream. She looked as if she’d stepped out of a nineteen fifties film and was just about to hop on a Vespa and explore Florence or Rome. Her cheeks were flush with excitement – with the girls and the fun, he imagined, and not because he was there.
Although – given the way she’d looked at him last night with sex in her eyes – he wasn’t so sure.
Which was another reason why he shouldn’t be here. The last thing he needed was to have this arrangement spilling into the personal, no matter how much his libido piqued whenever she was near.
‘Oliver. Hello.’ She beamed at him and, on cue, his libido jumped. ‘Girls, this is Mr Russell. The man who has very kindly offered us the first-floor fashion department in the new store next door as a runway for your designs. What do we say?’
Meet Me in London: The sparkling new and bestselling romance for 2020. Perfect escapism, for fans of Lindsey Kelk and Heidi Swain. Page 9