Читать книгу The Mills & Boon Ultimate Christmas Collection - Мишель Смарт, Kate Hardy - Страница 45

Chapter Thirty-Two

After coffee Kai went for a shower and I went to the office to finalize my plans; Timothy was due and I didn’t want to be caught unprepared. Masquerade balls were such fun to organize, but they were lots of work and we were already on the back foot time-wise.

I sat heavily, and tried to focus on the paperwork in front of me. There was a knock at the door and Timothy stuck his head in, surprising me, as I hadn’t heard his car in the driveway and wasn’t expecting him until later that afternoon.

“You’re early!” I said, getting up to greet him. He cut a fine figure with his tight jeans and fitted black-knit sweater, smooth skin and deep, intoxicating gaze, like he’d just stepped off the cover of a men’s fashion magazine.

Those deep-brown eyes of his bored straight into me, and for a moment I was a teenager again, belly flip-flopping, before I reined myself in. Being back in Evergreen sometimes brought out that gangly, bright-eyed girl, especially when Tim gave me the special smile he’d reserved only for me, once upon a time.

When he smiled a dimple appeared in his cheek. A memory rushed at me – I used to kiss that spot on his skin. “Yeah, sorry, I should have called. My boss has given me a checklist so long I don’t know if the party will even be possible in such a short amount of time, so I figured we’d better meet earlier.” By the pitch in his voice, it was clear Timothy was nervous. I couldn’t remember ever seeing him anything other than assured. This party was important to him.

I gestured for him to sit down and said, “Well, early is better than late. Would you like some coffee? Or hot chocolate?”

“No, I’m OK. Before we get started, I wanted to give you this.” He reached into his bag and produced an exquisitely wrapped box.

“You shouldn’t have, Tim!” I blushed, feeling like a teenager all over again in his presence. I didn’t know why he had that hold over me. It was like I regressed to the old me – and I wasn’t sure it was a good thing.

“It’ll make you smile, that’s all.”

Unwrapping the present, I pulled out a cassette from the box and laughed. “Oh God, is this our ultimate mix tape? From way back when?” I flicked it over to read the artists and song names, scrawled in Tim’s block writing.

It read:

Clio’s hits of 97

Tubthumping

Barbie Girl

Truly Madly Deeply

Foolish Games

When I came to the fifth song, I burst out laughing, “‘Spice Up Your Life’! Oh my God, do you remember dancing around to the Spice Girls, and thinking they were just the bee’s knees?”

His eyes twinkled with memory. “I remember watching you dance and thinking you were the bee’s knees, if not a little out of tune…”

And just like that I was back in the past – Tim just like he was now, but lankier in his teenage years; I’d taken to wearing sneakers and shiny velour tracksuits, just like Sporty Spice. Reminiscence was a wonderful thing because the fifteen-year-old Clio had had her life all mapped out: she was going marry Tim, have a million babies and work in fashion… It hit me suddenly that none of that had happened. I’d grown up and that girl was a distant memory, just someone I used to know. Still, it was sweet remembering a time I’d felt truly loved by Tim, no matter how young we’d been. You never forgot your first love, and seeing the man Tim had become, I thought I’d chosen well when I was younger.

“We must have been the only teenagers without a CD player back then. Remember?”

He smiled, bringing out the dimples in his cheeks again. “Things have never moved fast in Evergreen, and probably never will.”

“I bet you Aunt Bessie still has her old tape deck that I could play this on. Thanks, Tim. It’s one of the sweetest things I’ve ever been given.” It was full of sentimentality and the perfect gift. Each song would conjure a different memory, a different time and place.

“You’re welcome.”

“Right,” I said briskly, setting the cassette on my desk. “We’d better get started. We have a lot to discuss and not much time to organize everything.”

Usually, I could fix any party problem, especially under pressure, but so far all of our events at Cedarwood had been on a tight schedule. I couldn’t wait until we hosted one with some breathing room.

“So, you mentioned a masquerade ball, which is great, they’re so much fun. Today, though, let’s make some of the bigger decisions so we can order what we need and get moving quickly.” We sat across from each other at my desk.

Tim pulled a file from his briefcase. “OK, great.” He ran a hand through his hair. “My boss, Vinnie, wants a masquerade ball with all the bells and whistles. Money is no object. He’s inviting the owner of a construction company, Mr Whittaker, because he’s trying to win the right to sell his group of luxury condominiums, so in essence this party is to win him over.”

I leaned back in my chair, pen in hand. “OK, so we’ll give Mr Whittaker the VIP treatment.”

Timothy’s eyes twinkled. “Yes. We want to woo him, and the New Year’s Eve masquerade party is the perfect place for that. He’ll see we can get things done quickly and efficiently.”

I clapped my hands together, excited. Planning parties was always fun but New Year’s Eve was even more so – glitz and glamour was a given and we could go all out, making sure the lodge looked the part and that our guests had the time of their lives… all behind the mystery of a beautiful mask!

There was a tap on the door, and Amory poked her head around. “Sorry, I didn’t realize you were here already, Timothy.”

“It’s OK, Amory, we’ve only just started,” I said, and introduced them. I got Amory up to speed with the party and what Tim wanted; she flipped her laptop open and went to work, designing interactive invitations that would be emailed to guests. I grinned as we went through the main points of planning any party: the invite list, the budget (unlimited!) and the music, food, and drinks menu. As we chatted away, the puppy wandered in through the open door, and jumped straight on to Tim’s lap.

“Who’s this little guy?” he asked, clearly smitten with the little fella who’d so far managed to steal everyone’s hearts.

Amory grinned. “That’s little Scotty. Give him two minutes and he’ll be snoring on your lap. He’s like a windup toy, a bundle of energy one second, and asleep the next.”

Timothy chucked him under the chin. “He’s cute.”

Pride practically shone from Amory’s eyes. “Thanks.”

We fell into a serious discussion about the party, and managed to lock in almost every detail from the music (a string quartet) and table centerpieces (ornate gold candelabra), right down to the color of the napkins (rose-gold linen). Tim was certainly organized, which made our job so much easier.

“Right,” Amory continued, closing her laptop. “I’ll finish these invites in my office, and I’ll email them to you for your approval. Once that’s done. I’ll meet with our chef, Cruz, go over the menu, then email you a range to choose from. Cruz can then organize a tasting plate for you to approve. Clio will orchestrate everything else.”

I nodded, and Amory shook Tim’s hand, before he reluctantly handed back a snoring Scotty and she retreated to her own office in the parlor next door. “We have to move exceptionally fast to have everything delivered,” I reminded Tim, jotting more notes down, and hoping our suppliers would agree to help on such a short timeframe.

He smiled. “I’ll run everything by Vinnie as soon as I get back to the office. It’ll be the party of the year, Clio, I just know it.”

“It will,” I said, imagining the ballroom full of women in spectacular glittery evening gowns, holding Venetian masks to their faces as they flirted with strangers, the secrecy and mystery of a masquerade ball giving even the shyest person the chance to slip on another persona.

Tim tidied his paperwork away and sat back, clasping his hands together. “Who’d have thought we’d be sitting here like this, together again, after all these years. You’re amazing, Clio, not only buying the lodge and restoring it, but building a business people are already flocking to. No wonder you were always written up in the papers in New York. You were their events darling, and rightly so.”

I gulped, hoping he hadn’t read every article that featured me. The scandal that had left me jobless and fleeing to Evergreen was thankfully behind me, but no girl could ever get over being called a groom-stealer in black and white print. And even though the gossip had eventually faded as juicier stories came along, it still smarted – I didn’t want my friends to think I was that kind of person.

“Oh, they weren’t so much talking about me, rather my clientele when I worked in New York.” In my former life in the Big Apple, my celebrity clients always tipped off the press about their soirees. Everyone wanted to be known for having the most extravagant, exclusive parties. It helped me no end being written up as the party planner to the stars, but that life was over and I preferred anonymity at Cedarwood Lodge. Though we’d had a rogue reporter cover the bridal expo, it had been about the lodge as a venue, rather than the guest list, and I thought that was a step in the right direction.

Outside, snow drifted down, settling on windowpanes. The fire crackled for attention, so I stood to stretch and throw another log of wood on it. Timothy joined me by the fire, stepping a little closer than seemed necessary.

“It’s their loss,” he said quietly. “We have you now, and we’re not losing you to the big city again.” Tucking a tendril of my hair back, he stared into my eyes and I stood there stock-still, wishing I felt more for him than I did. Because I knew right then, that my heart belonged to another.

How the man in front of me was single still was beyond me, but I figured he was still getting over his divorce. Except, right now, he was flashing me enough signals that even a daydreamer like me could pick up on them. If only things had been different between us. But timing was everything and it was too late. Wasn’t it? As usual, when I even considered what could be with Timothy, Kai’s sun-kissed face popped into my mind.

I smiled, unsure of what to say. “Thanks for thinking of Cedarwood.”

“I was thinking of you, I must admit.”

The look he gave me was one I recognized so well from all those years ago – the type where he’d say something and follow it up with a slow, sultry kiss. In the quiet of the moment, we could still be those two teenagers who only needed each other… But we weren’t those people any more.

Trying not to look too obvious, I retreated to the safety of my desk, his presence overwhelming in close proximity. “Well, I appreciate it,” I said, pretending I didn’t understand his meaning. “And I promise it’ll be the party of year!”

“Did you ever think of me after you left, Clio?”

Oh boy. “Sure. I thought of you all.”

He rubbed his chin, like he was weighing up what to say. “I thought about you constantly. Picturing you in the big city, going from party to party, dressed to impress, meeting interesting people. Living this exotic life. I kicked myself a million times for letting you go.”

I waved him away. This was all getting way too sentimental for a business meeting. “That’s all in the past. We didn’t know any better back then…” And when I said we, I meant him, clearly. He was the one who’d got married and moved on quickly, and made babies with someone else: real, living, breathing children and whatnot. Still, I didn’t begrudge him anything. It really was a distant memory for me. And in hindsight had probably made staying and living in New York easier, because I hadn’t been pining for a long-distance love, just nursing a broken heart that had been surprisingly easy to heal in the bright lights of the big city.

“You say that, but I always wonder, you know? Would we have made it if you’d stayed? Would we have had a family, a house, a business together?”

He was speaking so fervently I had the urge to flee. What was the point of looking back? None of those things had happened, and they wouldn’t either. He’d had a wife, a family, the dog called Buster, the cookies baked from scratch, and some of it had worked out for him and some of it hadn’t.

It was too late for us. And yes, the thought made me a little sad – Timothy was one of the sweetest guys around – but he just wasn’t right for me. No matter how many times he asked for a date or turned up unannounced, all my fleeting feelings had been those of a long-forgotten teenage crush.

Here was the universe placing a good man in my path and I wasn’t interested. Instead I was pining after a man who would most likely head back to Australia once his family rift was fixed. Was I destined to be alone? I shook the thought from my mind – I didn’t want to be anyone’s second choice and, while Timothy wasn’t that kind of guy deep down, that was sort of how it felt. Like, you’re back, and you’re good enough, let’s pick up where we left off. But I wanted the fairy tale. The fluttery belly, the air sucked from the room when he walked in, the thought that I was number one in someone’s eyes. Not a consolation prize.

I coughed, and let out a nervous little laugh, trying to lighten the mood. “Ah, but you had all of that with someone else, and now you have two love, love…” I skidded on the word. “…Two lovely children, and you should be very proud. We’d have broken up after our first fight about where the couch went, and whose turn it was to put the trash out. We were never much good at agreeing on things.” I smiled at the memory of our epic fights – the slammed doors, the threats that we were finished, the fervent apologies and making up. We were such utterly different people. Tim had been an athlete through and through, and I’d been the dreamer with firm ideas about décor who’d yearned for another life somewhere more exotic than Evergreen.

With a deep breath, Tim smiled and said, “Feng Shui, I never really understood it.”

I laughed. “Feng Shui was forgotten by the time I got to New York. Out there it was something else every other week. A new hobby, a new passion. Following the latest craze, as you do.”

The sultry smile was back in place but dialed down a notch. Had I got my point across? “Well, no matter what, New York was good for you. But I’m glad you returned home safe.” His cellphone buzzed, and he tapped his vibrating pocket, his mouth tightening. “That’ll be Vinnie. I’ll call you later.” With a quick peck on my cheek, he walked out, answering the phone as he went.

I watched him drive off and counted the seconds, wondering how many it would take before Amory rushed in ready to grill me about Timothy. And sure enough: One, two, three, boom!

“So, what’s the deal with Timothy?” she asked, her forehead furrowing. “He practically had love hearts for eyes!”

I scrunched up my nose. “We’re strictly in the friend zone. My choice.”

She sighed, drawing out the sound.

“I know, I know,” I said. “I’m too fussy. But the thing is, I just don’t feel anything for him, not now.” I shrugged. “There’s no point pretending.”

She held up her hands. “I want to shake you until you see sense sometimes! Why can’t you go on a date and see what happens?”

There was real confusion in her voice. Poor Amory could never understand my hesitation with men. I just had to be sure, and I found taking that step so difficult. “Well, you know why, Amory! Yes, he’s sweet, buff, financially secure… but my heart doesn’t beat a rhumba when he’s around. It just beats the same old boompety boom, as usual. And I don’t want to give him false hope if there’s nothing there for me.”

“Oh, darling, you and your obsession with visceral reactions. Won’t he do? For some fun, someone to have dinner with, dare I say someone to tangle in the sheets with after a bottle of wine on a Saturday night? Don’t you miss men?”

I debated whether to lie. “Not really. I don’t think about tangling in the sheets at all, because I know how much those sheets cost.”

Her mouth fell open and she laughed uproariously. “Clio, darling, you’re hopeless. You go around kissing Kai and then pretend you haven’t.” I opened my mouth to protest, but she held up her hand. “Don’t think I don’t know about that! But what does it mean? Look, if you won’t tell Kai you like him, and you won’t consider a measly date with Timothy, what are you going to do? Snuggle up to your Egyptian cotton sheets for the rest of your life?”

“You have to admit they are nice sheets.”

“Seriously, Clio!” Pink spots appeared on her cheeks. Scotty chose that moment to run over and try and climb up my leg like a tree. I scooped him up and buried my face in his fur; he really was the sweetest thing.

“OK,” I said, trying to take her more seriously. “I don’t know who I’m going to snuggle up to. I might have to borrow your puppy.”

“Nice try, but you cannot get away with a subject change like that with me and expect I won’t notice. You need to be honest with yourself, Clio. Don’t let two good men walk out of your life because you’re scared to admit how you feel.”

“Who said I’m scared?”

“It’s written all over you, in big, fat, capital letters.”

I sighed. “I think you’re loved up and you want me to be loved up too, so everyone at the Loved Up Lodge can be joyous and loved up. Not all of us are so lucky, you know.”

“I can see you won’t listen to reason.” She tried to appear huffy and I stifled laughter, but it spilled out regardless.

“Darling,” she moaned. “Why won’t you just give love a chance?”

I fell back on my chair, and she followed suit. “I would, I really would this time. But he’s not ready.”

“Who?”

“Kai.”

She raised her eyebrows, “How do you know? Have you asked him?”

“Trust me, I just do. He’s going through something major in his life right now and love is not on the cards. The timing just isn’t right, which is the story of my life.”

“And yet he’s here.” The sparkle was back in her eye and I realized I’d said too much… she wasn’t going to give up that easily. “Kai’s sorting out Cedarwood again, just like he never left.”