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‘Or maybe they’ve got a secret crush on you and don’t want to sound stupid in front of you,’ Jared suggested.
‘I think,’ she said, ‘that might be a slightly worse thought. They’re still practically babies!’
He laughed and raised his glass. ‘To us,’ he said, ‘and finding some way to talk to each other.’
‘To us,’ she echoed, feeling ridiculously shy.
‘I forgot to ask you if you like fish,’ he said.
‘I do.’
‘Good. Though I’m afraid I cheated on the starter,’ he admitted. ‘Which is ready right now.’
He took two plates from the fridge: baby crabs served in their shell with a salad garnish, and served with thin slices of rye bread and proper butter.
‘I don’t care if you cheated. This is lovely,’ she said.
The main course was sea bass baked in foil with slices of lemon, rosemary potatoes, fine green beans and baby carrots. ‘This is fabulous,’ she said. ‘Super-healthy and super-scrumptious.’
He inclined his head in acknowledgement of the compliment. ‘Thank you.’
Pudding was a rich dark chocolate mousse served in a tiny pot with raspberries.
‘Now, this,’ Bailey said after the first mouthful, ‘is what you’d use to make any woman say yes.’
And then she realised what she’d said.
She put one hand to her face in horror. ‘Please tell me I didn’t say that out loud.’
‘I’m afraid you did.’ His voice had grown slightly husky, and his pupils were huge, making his eyes look dark.
She blew out a breath. ‘Um. I don’t know what to say.’
‘If it helps, I didn’t actually make it with the intention of using it to seduce you,’ he said. ‘Only … you’ve put an image in my head now.’
‘An image?’
He nodded. ‘Of me feeding you this, one spoonful at a time.’
So much for telling herself to treat this as just dinner with a friend. Right now, he’d put exactly the same image in her own head and she could hardly breathe. Especially as she could vividly remember what it had felt like when he’d kissed her.
What would happen if she held out her spoon to him? Would he let her feed the rich chocolate mousse to him? Or would he lean forward and kiss her?
Time hung, suspended.
Which of them would make the first move?
Dark colour was slashed across his cheekbones. And she could feel the heat in her own face. The beat of desire.
Would he kiss her again?
‘I think,’ he said, his voice even huskier now, ‘we probably need coffee.’
And some distance between them so they could both calm down again. ‘Yes,’ she whispered.
Though she couldn’t help watching him while he moved round the kitchen. For someone who was over six feet tall and so muscular, he was very light on his feet. He’d moved lightly when he’d danced with her, too. What would it be like if he …?
No.
Do not think of Jared Fraser naked, she told herself.
Except she couldn’t get the idea out of her head.
What would it be like, making love with Jared?
Her face heating even more, she tried to push the thought to the back of her mind and concentrated on her pudding. He did likewise when he’d finished making them both an espresso.
Silence stretched between them like wires, tighter and tighter.
They needed to break the tension now. Right now. Before they did something stupid. Like kissing each other until they were both dizzy. Right at that moment it was what she really wanted him to do. And she didn’t dare look at him in case he didn’t feel the same—or, worse, in case he did. She wasn’t sure which scared her more.
She sipped the coffee. ‘This is good,’ she murmured. Oh, for pity’s sake. Where was her stock of small talk when she needed it? Why couldn’t she talk to him about books and films and theatre?
Probably because her tastes were on the girly side and his would be decidedly masculine.
‘I’m glad you like the coffee.’ He paused. ‘Would you like to sit in the living room?’
‘Can I help you wash up first?’
‘No. That’s what a dishwasher is for,’ he said. Actually, it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to work with him in the kitchen. It would be way too easy to brush against each other. Turn to each other. Touch each other …
She followed him into his living room. Everything was in neutral tones and comfortable. There were several framed photographs on the mantelpiece and she couldn’t resist putting her coffee down so she could look at them more closely. His graduation, three more graduation photographs of what had to be his brothers and his sister as they looked so like him, wedding photographs of his brothers and sister, and various family portraits—including one of him with a small child.
His daughter? Or maybe she was his niece or his godchild. If he’d had a daughter, he would’ve mentioned it when they talked about kids at Joni’s wedding, surely?
‘Your family?’ she asked.
‘Yes. Also known as the doctors at Lavender Lane Surgery.’ He smiled. ‘They try to poach me onto the team every so often, but I like what I’m doing now.’
Then she came to a picture of a football team. Judging by the haircuts, she’d say the picture was nearly twenty years old. So it was pretty obvious what that represented. His first ever international match. But something had puzzled her for ages. ‘So how come, given that you have a Scots accent and a Scots surname, you played for England?’
‘I was born in London,’ he said, ‘and my mum’s English—so technically I could have played for either team, but as I lived in London I guess it made more sense to play for England.’ He smiled. ‘Dad said if my team ever played the under-twenty-one Scotland team, his loyalties would’ve been really divided.’
‘Like in our house. Whenever England plays Italy in the World Cup the boys end up cheering both sides.’
She picked him out immediately in the middle of the photograph. Mainly because that was the one she’d seen when she’d snooped on the Internet—not that she was going to tell him that. ‘That’s you at seventeen?’
‘Yes—the first time I played for England.’ He smiled. ‘It was an amazing feeling. And when I scored that goal, it felt like all my birthdays and Christmases at once.’
‘I bet.’ On impulse, she turned round and hugged him.
Big mistake, because then his arms came round her, and he dipped his head to kiss her. His mouth was warm and sweet and tempting, and she found herself responding, letting him deepen the kiss.
He picked her up and carried her over to the sofa, still kissing her, then settled down with her on his lap.
Right at that moment she really wanted him to carry her to his bed. To take her clothes off, bit by bit, and kiss every inch of skin as he uncovered it. And then to touch her again, make her forget about everything in the universe except him …
But then reality rushed back in. She wasn’t on the Pill. She hadn’t needed to be, because she’d steered clear of relationships, let alone sex. Condoms weren’t always effective. If they made love, what if she got pregnant, and what if …? She swallowed hard. She could still remember being rushed into the emergency department, the crippling pain in her abdomen followed by an even worse pain in her soul. And it froze her.
Jared was aware that Bailey had stopped kissing him back. He pulled away slightly and he saw she looked incredibly panicky. Something had clearly happened in her past, something that had put absolute devastation in her eyes.
He stroked her face. ‘Bailey, it’s all right. We can stop right now and I’m not going to push you.’
But the fear didn’t seem to go away. She remained where she was, looking haunted.
‘If you want to talk to me,’ he said, ‘I’ll listen, and whatever you tell me won’t go any further than me.’
‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ she muttered.
‘That’s OK, too.’ He kept holding her close. He had a few trust issues, too, thanks to Sasha cheating on him and then not giving him any say in keeping the baby. But he really liked what he’d seen of Bailey. It would be worth the effort of learning to trust and teaching her to trust him. They just needed some time.
Maybe it would help if he opened up a little first.
‘I used to be married,’ he said.
Bailey still looked wary, but at least she hadn’t pulled away.
‘I loved her. A lot. Sasha.’ Funny, saying her name didn’t make him feel as if he’d been put through the shredder any more. ‘We were married for three years. I thought we were happy, but I guess she wanted more of a WAG lifestyle than I could give her—so that meant seeing a footballer rather than the team doctor.’
Bailey looked surprised. ‘She left you for a footballer?’
Sasha had done a lot more than that, but Jared wasn’t quite ready to talk about that bit. About how she’d totally shattered his world. How she’d had an affair, got pregnant, decided she didn’t actually know who the father of her baby was as she’d been sleeping with them both, and had a termination without even telling him. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘She’d been seeing him for a while.’
‘That’s hard,’ Bailey said.
He shrugged. ‘It was at the time. But it was a couple of years ago now and I’m over it. We could probably just about be civil to each other if we were in the same room.’
‘It’s easier when you can be civil to each other,’ she said.
‘You’re on civil terms with your ex now?’
It was her own fault, Bailey thought. She’d practically invited the question.
And she had to be honest with Jared. ‘It wasn’t Ed’s fault that we broke up.’ She’d shut her husband out and pushed him away. Sex had been out of the question because the fear of getting pregnant and having another ectopic pregnancy had frozen her. Ed had tried to get through to her, but her barriers had been too strong. And so he’d given up and turned elsewhere for comfort. She couldn’t blame him for that. She hadn’t been in love with him any more, but the way her marriage had ended still made her sad. ‘Jared, I don’t want to talk about it. Not right now.’ She wriggled off his lap. ‘And I think I ought to go home.’
‘I’ll drive you. I only had one glass of wine so I’m under the limit.’
‘I’ll be fine on the Tube,’ she said. ‘To be honest, I could do with a bit of a walk to clear my head.’
‘Would you at least let me walk you to the Tube station?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ll be fine. But thank you—that was a really nice meal, and I appreciate it.’
And she needed to get out of here now, before she did something really stupid—like resting her head on his shoulder and crying all over him. It wouldn’t be fair to dump her baggage on him, and it really wasn’t fair to lead him on and let him think that this thing between them was going anywhere, because it couldn’t happen. She wasn’t sure she was ready to get that involved with someone again—especially someone who’d been hurt in the past and had his own baggage to deal with. She was attracted to Jared, seriously attracted, but that just wasn’t enough to let her take that risk. She didn’t want it all to go wrong and for him to get hurt because of her.
When Bailey still hadn’t texted him by lunchtime the next day, Jared knew that he’d have to make the first move.
But what had spooked her?
She’d flatly refused to talk about it, so it had to be something huge. He wasn’t sure how to get her to talk to him without making her put even more barriers up.
In the end, he called her. He half expected her to let the call go through to voicemail, but she answered. ‘Hi, Jared.’
‘How are you doing?’ he asked softly.
‘OK. Thanks for asking.’
‘Want to go and get an ice cream or something?’
‘Thanks, but I have a pile of work to do.’
It was an excuse, and he knew it. He could hear the panic in her voice, so he kept his tone calm and sensible. ‘So if you have a lot of work to do, a short break will help refresh you.’
She sighed. ‘You’re not going to let this go, are you?’
‘Nope,’ he agreed.
‘OK. What time?’
‘Now?’ he suggested. ‘It’s a nice afternoon.’
‘Are you standing outside my flat or something?’ she asked.
He laughed. ‘No. I’m sitting in my kitchen, drinking coffee. Which is the alternative offer if you don’t want ice cream.’
‘You’re pushy.’
‘No. I’m not letting you push me away, and it’s a subtle but important difference. I like you, Bailey,’ he said. ‘I think you and I could make a good team.’ There was a pause, and for a moment he thought he’d gone too far. But then she said, ‘I like you, too.’
It was progress. Of sorts.
‘I’ll see you here in, what, an hour?’ she asked.
‘An hour’s fine,’ he said.
Jared turned up with flowers. Nothing hugely showy, nothing that made a statement or made Bailey feel under pressure; just a simple bunch of pretty yellow gerbera. ‘They made me think of you,’ he said.
Funny how that made her feel warm all over. ‘Thank you. They’re lovely.’ She kissed his cheek, very quickly, and her mouth tingled at the touch of his skin. ‘I’ll put these in water.’ Which was the perfect excuse for her to back away, and she was pretty sure he knew it, too.
