Читать книгу Blind Dates and Other Disasters - Barbara Hannay - Страница 18

AND then the music stopped. The jazz CD had finished. With a slight cough Jacob stepped that same small step back to his original position.

This movement snapped Holly out of her trance and after blinking rapidly several times she too moved, willing her numb legs to step smartly around him and down the steps towards the kitchen.

‘I have the presentation in my bag,’ she prattled as she moved further and further from the window, and from Jacob, her heels clacking on the polished wood floor, the noise comfortingly louder than the beating of her heart. ‘Maybe we should sit on the couch and I’ll go through it with you quickly so I can get out of your hair.’

She placed the half-empty glass on the kitchen bench and reached down to grab her briefcase.

Jacob had moved down to the bookshelves and was restarting the CD in the discreetly concealed stereo. As the soft strains of the mellow song wafted from numerous hidden speakers around the apartment Jacob turned to face her.

Holly stood, rooted to the spot. The moment was upon her. This was what she had so keenly wished to see. The man in his environment.

The reality was a man a couple of inches over six feet, with thick springy dark hair, rich hazel eyes frayed by long, dark lashes. A man whose slightly crooked smile could turn her knees to butter and whose occasional dimples made her lose her focus and resolve every time they surfaced. A man wearing velvety soft chocolate-brown trousers, a lightweight sweater, which emphasized the width of his shoulders and the well-developed muscles beneath, a silver and gold two-tone sports watch, no rings or other jewellery. A man content to spend a Friday night at home on a comfortable couch, sipping on a good red wine and listening to lazy jazz music.

Jacob walked towards her and she saw that he was also a man wearing no shoes. So that’s how he crept up on me so quietly, Holly thought as her eyes snapped back up to his. The cheeky look in his eyes dared her to accuse him of anything.

As he approached her she stood her ground, her briefcase held like armour in front of her. Once at her side he leaned towards her. Her breath caught in her throat and she could not move. Then at the last second his hand reached out, grabbing her red wine glass from the kitchen bench top. Then just as casually he turned and strolled towards the lounge. He had not come within a foot of her yet she was shaking from his proximity.

‘Are you coming?’ he called over his shoulder.

Holly released the deep breath she had been holding, gathered her wits then walked over to join him. He had lounged on one of the long four-seater couches in his usual idle manner and she joined him there, though far enough away that their knees had no chance of touching.

‘What important details have you got to show me?’ Jacob asked, amusement lacing every word.

Holly glared at him. ‘You may not think this meeting will be valuable, but if it means that Anabella’s party is the better for it then why object?’

Rather than be offended, he looked at her with respect, as he always seemed to when she stood up to him. ‘Go ahead, then. Though I must say I never once said your coming here would prove invaluable.’

‘Yes, well, good, then,’ she stammered as she collected her thoughts. But once she clapped eyes back on her party notes, her confidence returned. This she could do in her sleep.

She went through every detail regarding venue, catering and décor, leaving not a single suggestion out. She finished her presentation with the fact she had chosen a luxurious banquet hall owned by Lincoln Holdings, as she already knew he preferred to use his own establishments for his events. When Jacob did not respond she looked up to find his eyes spectacularly crossed.

‘What was that for?’

He uncrossed his eyes and grinned. ‘First things first, Holly—you do realise that I am a man?’

She had not met a man more obviously masculine. ‘For the sake of argument, yes.’

‘Well, then, you must understand that I find words such as “georgette” and “decoupage” mind-boggling.’

Holly went to interrupt but Jacob held a finger to her lips, shutting her up quick smart.

‘Believe me, I am not diminishing what you do, I hired you because I admit you can do it better. If you came here for my approval, then you have it. Book everything. Hire everybody. Just go right ahead. But first things first, stay right where you are.’

He quickly pulled his finger from her mouth, kissed it and placed it back on her lips before bounding out of the chair and jogging into the kitchen.

‘Now, I have to give this a quick stir and add the veggies for half a second and then I will be able to blind you with my culinary talents.’

‘Oh, no,’ Holly said, shoving her bits and pieces quickly into her briefcase, fighting the urge to vigorously rub away the warm impression his finger had left on her lips. ‘I thought I made it clear I wasn’t staying for dinner.’

As she passed by the kitchen her nostrils were filled with that same delicious soy and honey aroma she had smelled earlier. Her stomach grumbled and she placed her hand over it to quell the noise, hoping Jacob had not heard.

‘Do you have dinner plans already?’ he asked. Another hot date with a potential husband, was left unsaid, but it echoed clearly enough in the air between them.

Holly opened her mouth to answer and in the moment during which she should have come up with a believable lie, she wavered, picturing her dark, empty apartment and the leftover tuna casserole she was planning to reheat.

Still she was about to decline when she caught the look on Jacob’s face. Though he was acting cool, aloof, indifferent, he was obviously sweating on her answer. His lips had thinned, pressed together too tightly, he was stirring the dinner ingredients more vigorously than seemed necessary and he kept shooting her short, accusatory sideways glances. If she hadn’t known him better she would have thought him jealous.

After several moments of telling silence, Jacob’s shoulders relaxed, his thinned lips softened into his usual crooked, beguiling smile and she knew he had caught her hesitation loud and clear.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘So stay.’ He added the vegetables to the mix with a deft hand.

He seemed so relaxed. As if he had flipped a lever and they had gone from God knew what to business associates in the blink of an eye. Maybe he could turn his nature on and off like that but Holly was not so fortunate.

‘Don’t you find this in the least bit uncomfortable?’

‘What’s that?’

‘That you know about my future plans and desires. I find it uncomfortable enough to face you as a friend of a friend, much less as a prospective client.’

That earned her another of his unreadable glances. ‘I understand what you think you mean,’ he said, ‘but I just don’t believe you.’

‘Excuse me?’

He paused, stopped stirring and stared. ‘The truth is I like you, Holly.’

Holly gripped her briefcase tight, clinging to it, feeling as though if she let go it would rise to the ceiling like a dozen helium balloons and take her with it.

He paused a moment to taste the stir-fry and, obviously finding it satisfactory, he finished his thoughts.

‘My closest friends are your closest friends. My business and your business will be of great benefit to each other. So what if I know that your current goal is hooking a husband and I am still willing to have you over to my place on a dinner date? Maybe one thing does not have to exclude the other.’

Holly’s knees all but buckled beneath her.

So much for his agenda. So much for it’s business not personal. Who was he kidding?

She was one big spanner in the works of any agenda he could ever hope to follow. Standing there, her glorious hair spilling over her shoulders, her huge eyes pleading for him to put her out of her misery, one way or the other. It was all he could do not to just haul her off to his bedroom like some caveman and show her exactly how uncomfortable she made him feel. He didn’t know what they were. But they were no more ‘friends of friends’ than they were business associates.

He should change his mind. Thank her for her thorough presentation and send her home. But the words that came out of his mouth were, ‘It’s not complicated. Let’s stop avoiding each other when we could be having so much more fun enjoying each other. At least until the thing you most wish for becomes more imminent anyway.’

There. Now how’s that for a spanner in the works?

Jacob wiped his hands on a clean teatowel, poured two new glasses of wine and grabbed two rolled-up napkins from the kitchen bench. He passed her on his way to the dining table, the determined look in his eyes daring her to disagree with his perfectly sensible proposal.

What thing? Holly wondered, the idea of she and Jacob ‘enjoying each other’ pretty much blotting out the rest of his speech.

Oh, a husband. A partner. Someone to love you. Someone like Jacob.

And like a bolt of lightning it hit her. Right in the stomach. Like a sucker punch. And she was lucky not to have collapsed under its weight.

Talk about complicating things. She was head over heels for Jacob.

Ever since she had seen him dragging his heavy luggage along the footpath, she had been lost. She had been filled with a longing, which she had mistakenly tried to shoulder onto someone else, anyone else, other than the one who had produced it in the first place. She knew without any doubt her husband hunt had been over from the moment it began.

He lay the glasses on the table, unrolled the linen napkins, which contained two sets of cutlery, and shifted a small vase of wildflowers so they would not hamper their view of one another across the table. Every move appeared to her in slow motion.

It cannot possibly be love, she thought. I barely know him. But you can know someone for ever and not love them, so why can’t the opposite be possible? And the unremitting feeling of weightlessness since he’d admitted to merely liking her was like nothing she had ever felt before.

But he’s not the marrying kind and has said as much from day one.

Remember?

And the whole perfect-husband theory meant you were not to fall for a guy like him. A guy who was self-important, shallow and self-serving.

Remember?

But she could not remember how she could ever have thought those things about Jacob. The man whistling melodiously along with the lovely music was confident, to be sure. But more than that he was protective and generous, kind and considerate. He was also barefoot and cooking up a storm. For her.

The stir-fry sizzled enthusiastically and Jacob jogged back to the kitchen and turned off the stove. He grabbed two dinner plates, onto which he heaped generous portions of the delicious-looking dinner.

‘No more excuses, okay,’ Jacob said.

Holly did her best to compose her features to appear the same as she had looked before her alarming revelation.

‘I have cooked enough of this lip-smacking dinner for the both of us. You have no other dinner plans. You are here already. You are able-bodied enough to grab the bottle of wine and bring it to the table. Put down that heavy briefcase and come give me a hand.’

Okay, Holly thought, knowing something had switched inside of her and she was going to have a hell of a time switching back. Whatever you say.