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She shook her head. ‘You’ve been quiet for you, today. Something’s obviously bothering you. Come and sit down and talk to me.’
‘I’m busy cooking dinner.’
She sniffed. ‘Chicken casseroled in red wine, baked potatoes and salad?’
He smiled wryly. ‘All right. So most of the cooking’s already done. How did you know what I was cooking, anyway?’
‘Apart from the fact it’s your signature dish? Educated guess,’ she said dryly. ‘You just emptied that bottle into a clean glass.’
‘I could’ve been swigging straight from the bottle,’ he pointed out.
They both laughed, then he shrugged. ‘Anyway, I’ve been quiet because this is what happens when I have too much time on my hands. I start thinking—and that’s dangerous.’
‘Talk to me, Alex,’ she said softly. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘This is going to sound mad.’
‘Tell me anyway.’
He sighed and joined her at the table. ‘I’m thirty-five, Bel. My little sisters are all settled, married with a family. All the people I was at university with have settled down—some of them are on their second marriage, admittedly, but they’re settled. And although I love my life, I’m starting to wonder if what I’ve got is really enough for me any more. If it’s what I really want.’
‘So you’re saying you want to settle down and have children?’ Isobel asked carefully.
‘Yes. No. Maybe.’ He took a sip of wine. ‘I suppose what I’m saying is that I’m starting to think about what I do now. I’m doing something about my job, but what about the rest of my life? Do I want be one of these eternal bachelors who still behave as if they’re in their twenties when they’re pushing sixty?’
She smiled. ‘I can’t quite see you doing that, Alex.’ He’d still be immensely charming when he was almost sixty. He’d still turn heads. But he’d also have dignity and wouldn’t try to pretend he was still young.
‘But time goes by so fast, Bel. It seems like yesterday that Helen had the boys, and now they’re seven. Next thing I know, I’m going to be forty-five and I’ll be the spare man invited to dinner parties to make up the numbers, sitting next to the woman who’s just got divorced and either hates all men or is desperate for company.’
She frowned. ‘Alex, this isn’t like you. And this whole thing about looking to the future…oh, my God.’ A seriously nasty thought clicked into place. The reason why he suddenly wanted to settle down. ‘Is there something you’re not telling anybody?’
‘Such as?’
Well, if he wasn’t going to say it, she would. This needed to be out in the open. Right now. She swallowed hard. ‘You’re seriously ill?’
For a moment, there was an unreadable expression on his face, and Isobel felt panic ice its way down her spine. Please, no. Not this.
‘I’m fine. In perfect health,’ he told her. ‘But I did hear some bad news about a close friend while I was on my last dig.’
Someone else. Not Alex. Relief flooded through her, followed by a throb of guilt. Bad news was still bad news. ‘I hope your friend’s OK now.’
He shook his head. ‘He didn’t make it. It didn’t seem right, standing at Andy’s graveside only a couple of years after I’d been in that same church for his wedding. He’s the first one of my friends to die, and it’s made me realise how short life can be. How I shouldn’t take things for granted. And I got to thinking, maybe it’s time I did something about settling down.’ He looked thoughtful. ‘That’s one of the things I really liked about the specifications for this job. There’s enough travelling to stop me getting itchy feet, but not so much that I can’t have a family life as well. It’s the best of both worlds.’
A family life.
So he did want children.
Which meant, Isobel thought, that he needed to marry someone who could definitely have children—not someone who had a huge question mark hanging over her. After her miscarriages, the doctor had reassured her that the statistics were all on her side, that plenty of women went on to have healthy babies afterwards. Miscarriages were so common that the hospital wouldn’t even begin to look into the causes until a woman had had at least three.
But Gary hadn’t wanted to take the risk. He hadn’t wanted to stick around and wait.
And although Alex wasn’t like Gary—she knew he had the integrity to stand by her—he wanted a family. Something she might not be able to give him.
Telling him the truth was out of the question. If she did, she’d see pity in his face and she’d feel that she was no longer his equal. No way did she want that to happen.
But not telling him… If he was serious about settling down, if he’d meant that proposal and intended to ask her again, she’d have to refuse. It wouldn’t be fair to accept. If it did turn out that she couldn’t carry a baby to term, that she couldn’t have children…she didn’t want their relationship to go the same way as her marriage had. Down the tubes.
She pushed the thoughts away. This wasn’t about her. It was about him. ‘Hey, you’ll be a shoo-in for the job. And once you actually stay in one place for more than three seconds, you’ll find Ms Right,’ she said brightly.
She suppressed the wish that it could’ve been her.
They spent the rest of the evening talking shop, the way they always did. And Alex behaved the next morning as if everything was just fine, so she followed his lead and pretended he hadn’t opened his heart to her, the previous night.
She’d been at her desk for an hour when a courier arrived.
Odd. She wasn’t expecting a delivery. But when she opened the parcel, she discovered a box of seriously good chocolates. And there was a note in familiar spiky script: ‘Thanks for listening.’
Alex might be a whirlwind, but he never took anything for granted.
She flicked into her email program.
Thanks for the chocs. Unnecessary but very, very nice. Bel x
A few moments later, her monitor beeped. Mail from Alex.
Least I could do. Don’t eat them all at once.
Ha. As if she would. She smiled, and carried on with the report she was writing.
A few moments later, her monitor beeped again.
Doing anything tonight?
Nothing special. Why?
It was a while before he responded. And then:
Consider your evening annexed. Meet you from work.What time do you finish today?
Six. Do I need to change first?
If you’re dressed as Flavia, yes! Otherwise, fine as you are. Ciao. A x
Which told her absolutely nothing about what he had planned. Typical Alex.
But she was busy and it was easier to go along with him, so she didn’t push the issue.
He was waiting for her in the foyer at six, wearing a casual shirt and dark trousers and looking absolutely edible. For a moment, her heart actually skipped a beat.
But this wasn’t a date. This was just two friends meeting up while one of them was briefly in London. The fact that he was staying with her was by the by. They weren’t living together and it wasn’t that kind of relationship.
And that marriage proposal hadn’t been a real one. She really needed to get a grip.
‘Hi.’ His smile did seriously strange things to her insides, and she strove for cool.
‘Hi, yourself. Good day?’
‘Not bad.’ He slid a casual arm round her shoulders and ushered her down the steps. ‘How was yours?’
‘Fine.’ She was glad her voice wasn’t as shaky as she felt. This was crazy. She and Alex had always had a tactile relationship. So how come this didn’t feel like his usual hug?
‘Good. You hungry?’
She grinned. ‘Considering I’ve been eating chocolate all day…’
‘What, and you didn’t even save one for me?’
She laughed. ‘No. But I did share them in the office.’
‘Hmm. So was that a yes or no to food first?’
‘Food before what?’
‘Before…’ He took his arm from her shoulders, fished in his pocket for his wallet, then removed two tickets and handed them to her.
She felt her eyes widen. Two tickets to that evening’s performance of Much Ado about Nothing at the Globe. The best seats in the house. ‘These are like gold dust, Alex!’ And to get them at short notice he must’ve paid a fortune to one of the ticket agencies.
‘I wanted to see the play, and it’s more fun going with someone who actually enjoys it, too.’
‘At least let me pay for my own ticket.’
‘No. But you can buy me a drink in the interval, if you insist.’
‘I do insist.’
‘“My dear Lady Disdain,”’ he teased.
‘I did that play for A level,’ she reminded him.
‘I know.’ He rolled his eyes. ‘I used to have to listen to you and Saskia murdering it in the summer house when I was home in the holidays.’
‘Murdering it?’ She cuffed his arm. ‘I’ll tell her that, next time I talk to her. And then you’ll be in trouble.’
‘No, I won’t. I’m her favourite brother.’
‘Her only brother,’ Isobel corrected.
‘Still her favourite,’ Alex said. ‘So. Food first or later?’
She glanced at her watch and at the time on the ticket. ‘Better make it later. Unless you want to grab something from a fast-food place?’
‘I’d rather wait and have something decent.’
‘Later it is, then.’
The tube was so crowded again that they didn’t get a chance to talk on the way over to Southwark. And the bar at the Globe was so crowded that they were forced to sit incredibly close together to have any chance of hearing each other speak.
Odd.
Alex was used to touching Isobel—giving her a hug hello and a kiss on the cheek when they said goodbye—but this was different. Now, he was aware of her in another way. Of the softness of her skin. Of the sweet scent of her perfume—a mixture of jasmine and vanilla and orange blossom. Of the shape of her mouth.
And it shocked him how much he suddenly wanted to kiss her.
‘Alex?’
‘Sorry. It’s a bit noisy in here. I can barely hear you.’ Acting on an impulse he knew was going to land him in trouble, but he was unable to resist, he scooped her onto his lap.
‘Alex!’
She was protesting—but she slid one arm round his neck to stop herself falling off his lap.
‘It’s easier to hear you if you talk straight into my ear,’ he said, his mouth millimetres from her own ear. ‘That way you don’t have to shout. And I don’t get backache from leaning down to you.’
She cuffed him with her free hand. ‘That’s below the belt.’
And maybe this hadn’t been such a good idea. Because the whisper of her breath against his ear sent a peculiar sensation down his spine. A feeling he really didn’t want to acknowledge.
He took refuge in teasing. ‘I apologise… Shorty.’
‘Huh.’ She rolled her eyes.
He knew she wasn’t upset with him; this was the kind of banter they’d always indulged in. The kind of banter that was safe because their friendship was deep and it had been practically lifelong.
When she’d finished her glass of wine, he glanced at his watch. ‘We’d better find our seats.’
‘Sure.’ She slid off his lap, and Alex was shocked to discover he actually missed the warmth of her body against his.
The production was fantastic. And as soon as Benedick spoke his ‘dear Lady Disdain’ line, Alex glanced at Isobel— to see her glancing straight back at him. He curled his fingers round hers, acknowledging that he knew what she was remembering. To his pleasure, she didn’t pull away. But all the way through the play, when Beatrice and Benedick were fencing verbally, he found himself thinking of himself and Isobel.
‘I do love nothing in the world so well as you. Is not that strange?’
His fingers involuntarily tightened for a moment round hers.
This was crazy.
Of course he wasn’t in love with Isobel. She was his friend.
But it didn’t alter the fact that he was holding her hand. Treating this like a date, when it wasn’t one at all.
