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‘This assignment means a lot to me,’ Allegra pointed out, but she didn’t look very comfortable about it. ‘That’s the deal: take it or leave it.’
‘That’s blackmail!’ said Max.
‘And your point is...?’ she countered bravely.
It was all Max could do not to grin. He heaved a disgruntled sigh instead. ‘Oh, all right. If you’re going to be like that, I don’t have much choice, do I? I’ll take part in your precious assignment—but you’d better not have been joking about Darcy King!’
One moment he was pretending to glower at Allegra, the next his arms were full of her. Beaming, she launched herself at him, pushing him back down onto the sofa cushions as she hugged him. ‘Oh, I love you, Max! Thank you, thank you, thank you!’ she babbled, blizzarding kisses over his face. ‘You won’t regret it, I promise you. I’m going to change your life, and it’s going to be perfect!’
* * *
Allegra ran from the lift as fast as she could on her polka dot slingbacks. The shoes were a fun twist to the rest of her look, a demure tweed two-piece with a short skirt and three-quarter length sleeves that channelled her inner executive-cum-fashion diva, and Allegra had been pleased when she left home. She projected confidence and style, as befitted a girl on the verge of her big break.
Until her tights laddered, that was.
If only she hadn’t stopped to say hello to Mrs Gosling, but how could she run past when her elderly neighbour’s face lit up at the prospect of someone to talk to? Mrs Gosling spent most of her days walking her dog, an excitable mutt called, for reasons Allegra had never understood, Derek, and that morning she had been all tangled up in the lead while Derek literally ran rings round her.
Late as she was, Allegra had had to stop and disentangle Mrs Gosling and hear about Derek’s latest antics. Allegra had a friend whose small daughter Molly loved to be told how naughty Derek was, and Allegra had taken to writing out each story, exaggerating for effect, and illustrating them with little sketches of Derek’s mischievous face. Molly adored them.
‘You should put them into a book,’ Libby had said. ‘The Glorious Adventures of Derek the Dog. Mrs G would love it.’
But Allegra had shrugged the idea aside. ‘They’re just for Molly really.’
But that morning she had only listened with half an ear as she sorted out the lead and bent to greet Derek, who jumped at her in ecstasy.
That was the end of the tights.
Oh, God, she was so late! Red-faced and panting, Allegra practically fell through the doors into Glitz’s super hip offices. The editorial department sprawled over the top floor of a converted warehouse. Most days the buzz hit Allegra the moment she got out of the lift. She loved the gloss of the office, the smell of new clothes and expensive perfumes, the stark décor contrasting with the colourful scatter of accessories and shoes displayed like works of art. She loved the frantic thrum in the air, the way it was punctuated with dramatic cries and screams of excitement.
Except when Stella was present, of course, in which case everyone was very quiet unless asked to speak.
It was ominously silent when Allegra collapsed against the reception desk, a funkily curved piece of steel, and held her hand against her side.
‘The editorial meeting’s just started,’ Lulu, the receptionist, lowered her voice and eyed Allegra with sympathy. ‘You know Stella hates it when anyone is late. You’d better pretend you fell under a bus or something.’
‘I might as well if I don’t get in there and get my assignment,’ groaned Allegra, forcing herself upright.
Smoothing down her hair, she took a deep breath and headed towards the conference room, only to be called back by Lulu’s frantic whisper.
‘You can’t go in like that!’ She pointed at Allegra’s legs. ‘Tights!’
Allegra clutched her head. She’d forgotten her tights for a moment. She’d soon learnt to keep a spare pair in her bag, but changing them would take precious seconds.
‘What’s worse?’ she asked Lulu desperately. ‘Being late or laddered tights?’ Lulu’s astounded expression was answer enough. Clearly, Allegra shouldn’t have needed to ask. ‘You’re right, I’d better change...’
It was Allegra’s second mistake of the day. Dashing into the loos, she found Hermione, one of the marketing interns, sobbing her heart out in a cubicle, and by the time Allegra had coaxed her out and listened to her tale of woe, she was not only horribly late but had acquired two mascara smudges on the pale cashmere jumper tucked so stylishly into her skirt.
That was what you got for dispensing comforting hugs, thought Allegra bitterly as she stripped off her tights, but she was in such a hurry to get the new ones on that she managed to stick a finger through them.
‘Oh, sod it!’ At least this time the ladder was hidden under her skirt. Bundling the first pair into the bin, Allegra swiped at her hair. She looked completely manic, but there was nothing she could do about it now. If she didn’t get into that editorial meeting, she’d lose out on the assignment. Ianthe Burrows was probably already putting forward an alternative.
‘Sorry,’ she mouthed generally, sliding into the conference room at last and every head swivelled to stare at her, with her flushed cheeks and tousled hair. There was a resounding silence. Stella didn’t say anything but her gaze rested for a crushing few seconds on the smudges before dropping to Allegra’s knees as she stood frozen just inside the room.
Against her will, Allegra found herself following her editor’s gaze to where the ladder had snaked out from under her skirt. Horrified, she watched it unravel over her knee and head down her leg. She could practically hear the unzipping sound.
Why was there never a black hole around when you needed to jump into one?
‘Editorial meetings start at ten,’ said Stella, and Allegra cringed at the lack of inflexion in her voice.
‘Yes, I know...I—’ She broke off. She couldn’t explain about Derek and Mrs Gosling and Hermione. Stella wouldn’t care and Allegra would sound like an idiot. Even more of an idiot. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said instead.
A fractional incline of Stella’s head served as her dismissal. The conversation returned to the latest couture debut, and Allegra slunk into a chair at the back. Pulling out notebook, pen, iPad and PDA, she willed the burning colour in her face to fade.
Fortunately, she didn’t appear to have missed too much and as the discussion warmed up into articles about how to give a rock’n’roll twist to the latest looks, and the pros and cons of being friends-with-benefits, she kept her head down and let her racing pulse slow. Mindlessly doodling Derek winding Mrs Gosling up in his lead, she listened to the arguments for and against sleeping with a friend. It wasn’t something she would do herself. She’d be afraid that it would spoil the friendship. Because how could it possibly be the same afterwards?
What would it have been like if Max had kissed her all those years ago? Allegra was aware of an odd jolt of heat at the thought. It had to be the thrill of the forbidden, because Max was practically her brother.
Eeuww, the very idea was disturbing at a whole load of levels! But there had been something hot and dangerous in the air that night, something that risked changing everything, and they’d both known it. Perhaps that was why they had pulled back before they did something they would both have regretted.
Because if they’d kissed, they wouldn’t have stopped at a kiss, and then it really would have been awkward. It wasn’t even as if Max was her type, Allegra thought, even as she began an absent sketch of how he had looked lying on the sofa the night before. And she certainly wasn’t his. Emma was neat and dainty and blonde, a sweet little pixie, while Allegra was leggy and chaotic.
No, it was much better that they’d stayed just friends, without any jiggery-pokery, as Ianthe liked to refer to sex. They would never have been able to share the house, like now, if they’d slept together, and she wouldn’t have felt comfortable asking him to take part in the assignment.
Thank God they hadn’t actually kissed.
Or done anything else.
Pursing her lips, Allegra studied her drawing. It looked like Max, but the mouth wasn’t quite right... She made a slight adjustment to his upper lip and his face sprang to life so abruptly that her heart jumped a little: steady eyes, stubborn jaw, a quiet, cool mouth. She hadn’t realised how well she had memorised the angles of his cheek, the way his hair grew. She had made him look...quite attractive.
Her mouth dried and all at once she was remembering how she had hugged him in her excitement the night before. She hadn’t thought about it. He was Max, and he’d just agreed to take part in something Allegra knew he was going to hate. Hugging him was the obvious thing to do.
But when her arms were around his neck and her lips pressed to his cheek, she had suddenly become aware of how solid he was, how male. How familiar and yet how abruptly strange. The prickle of stubble on his jaw had pressed into her cheek and she’d breathed in the clean masculine smell of him and something had twisted hard and hot in her belly.
Something that had felt alarmingly like lust. Which of course it couldn’t have been because, hey, this was Max.
Beside her, Georgie, one of the few journalists who was as junior as Allegra, leant over and raised her eyebrows appreciatively. ‘Your guy?’ she mouthed.
Allegra shook her head, unaccountably flustered. ‘Just a friend.’
‘Right.’ Georgie’s smile was eloquent with disbelief.
Quickly Allegra sketched in Max’s shirt, including every stripe, and the collar that was buttoned too high, and Georgie’s smile faded.
‘Oh.’
Quite, thought Allegra. She should do less thinking about Max’s mouth and more remembering his absolutely appalling taste in shirts.
‘Allegra!’
The deputy editor’s voice made Allegra jerk her eyes to the front, where Stella was looking sphinx-like and Marisa, her deputy, harried. ‘Could we have a moment of your attention?’
Allegra fought the impulse to say, Yes, miss. ‘Yes, of course.’
‘Making Mr Perfect...did you get anywhere with that?’
Clearly expecting the answer to be no, their eyes were already moving down the list, on to the next idea. This was her moment.
‘Actually, yes, I did,’ Allegra said and a ripple of surprise ran round the room.
‘You found someone to take part?’ Stella’s expression was as inscrutable as ever but Allegra told herself that the very slight life of her editor’s immaculate brows was a good sign.
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘Who is he?’ That was Marisa.
‘The brother of a friend of mine. Max.’ Why did just saying his name suddenly make her feel warm?
‘What does he look like?’ asked Marisa practically. ‘I suppose it’s too much to hope that he’s a hunk?’
Allegra glanced down at her sketch of Max on the sofa: solid, steady-eyed. Ordinary. Nothing special. Her eyes rested on his mouth for a moment and there it came again without warning, a quick, disturbing spike of her pulse. She looked away.
‘I wouldn’t say that he was a hunk, exactly,’ she said cautiously, ‘but I think he’ll brush up well.’
‘Sounds promising. What’s he like?’
‘He’s a civil engineer,’ said Allegra, as if that explained everything. ‘He’s pretty conventional, plays rugby and doesn’t have a clue about style.’ She lifted her shoulders, wondering how else to describe him. ‘He’s just a bloke, really.’
‘No girlfriend in the wings? We don’t want anyone making a fuss about him spending time with Darcy.’
Allegra shook her head. ‘He’s just been dumped by his fiancée and he’s going to work abroad soon so he’s not interested in meeting anyone else at the moment. He’s perfect,’ she said.
‘And he knows exactly what’s involved?’ Marisa insisted. ‘He’s happy to go ahead?’
Happy might be stretching it, thought Allegra, remembering uneasily how she had had to blackmail Max, but this was no time for quibbling. Her big chance was this close, and she was ready to seize it.
‘Absolutely,’ she said.
Marisa glanced at Stella, who nodded. ‘In that case, you’d better get on to Darcy King and set up the first date straight away.’
THREE
‘So this is where you work.’ Max looked around him uneasily. The office was aflutter with gorgeous glossy women, all eyeing him as if they had never seen a man in a suit before and weren’t sure whether to laugh or pity him.
It ought to have been gratifying to be the focus of so much undivided female attention, but Max was unnerved. He felt like a warthog who had blundered into a glasshouse full of butterflies.
Why the hell had he agreed to this stupid idea? He’d been lying there minding his own business and then Allegra had slid onto the sofa next to him and before he knew what was happening he’d been tangled up in her idea and lost in those mossy eyes and suddenly all he cared about was making her happy.
He’d even suggested his own blackmail. He must have been mad.
But the smile on Allegra’s face had lit up the room and left him scrabbling for breath, and when she’d thrown herself into his arms the feel of her had left Max oddly light-headed. Her hair had trailed silkily over his face as she threw her arms round him and pressed her lips to his cheek, and the smell of her perfume had sent his mind spinning.
To Max’s horror, his body had taken on a mind of its own. Without him even being aware of what he was doing, his arms had clamped round her and for a moment he had held her against him and fought the crazy urge to slide his hands under that skimpy top and roll her beneath him.
Which would have been a very, very, very bad idea.
The next instant Allegra had pulled back, babbling excitedly about the assignment. As far as she was concerned, it had just been a sisterly hug.
That was all it had been, Max reminded himself sternly.
And now it seemed he was committed to the charade. ‘The first thing is to smarten you up.’ Allegra had gone all bossy and produced a clipboard and a list. ‘Can you take an afternoon off? You’re going to need a complete makeover.’
Max didn’t like the sound of that. He didn’t like the sound of any of it, come to that, but he’d given his word.
‘I could take some flex leave,’ he said grudgingly. He didn’t want anyone at work to get wind of what was happening. That morning he’d told them that he was going to the dentist and, looking around Glitz’s glossy offices, he couldn’t help thinking that root canal surgery might be preferable to what lay ahead.
He was going to be styled by the great Dickie himself. Allegra had impressed on Max what an honour this was. ‘If he’s bored or irritated, Dickie’s likely to storm off, so please just be nice!’ she said again as she led him between glass-walled offices and down to a studio, her sky-high heels clicking on the polished floor that she had told him was known as the runway. Apparently this was because everybody could see and comment on the outfits passing, something Max would rather not have known. He could feel all the eyes assessing his hair, his suit, his tie, his figure as he followed Allegra.
She was in businesslike mode today in skinny trousers, an animal-print top and those fearsome-looking boots, but he had to confess he preferred it when she wore a dress. She looked less...intimidating.
Plus, it showed off her legs, which were pretty spectacular.
‘I’m always nice,’ said Max.
Allegra cast him a look over her shoulder. ‘You weren’t nice about the outfit I wore last night.’
Max had been heating up a curry when she had appeared in the kitchen doorway, wearing the most extraordinary outfit. A riot of clashing colours and patterns, Max hadn’t known how to describe what she was wearing, but when she’d twirled and asked what he thought, he’d made the big mistake of telling her. Words like fruit salad and dog’s dinner had passed his lips.
He wouldn’t be offering any more sartorial advice.
‘Here we are.’ Fretfully, Allegra pushed him into the studio. ‘Just...nod and smile. And follow my lead,’ she muttered under her breath, fixing a bright smile to her face and dragging Max towards a tiny, imperious figure with close-cropped grey hair, huge red spectacles and a red and white dotted bow tie.
‘You didn’t tell me I’d have to be careful not to step on him,’ Max murmured and Allegra hissed at him to be quiet.
‘Dickie, I’m so thrilled to be working with you,’ she said, practically curtseying.
Dickie nodded regally, and they exchanged the obligatory air kiss before he turned his gaze to Max. ‘And oo iz thees?’ he said, his French accent so thick that Max thought he had to be putting it on.
‘Max Warriner,’ he said, stepping forward and shaking Dickie’s hand firmly before Allegra could pretend that he was a deaf mute. He sure as hell wasn’t going to kiss Dickie. ‘Good to meet you,’ he said briskly.
Dickie looked at his hand as if he had never had it wrung before, and then at Allegra, who smiled apologetically.
‘Max is here for the Making Mr Perfect feature,’ she said, lowering her voice. ‘You know, the one with the complete makeover.’
‘Ah, oui...’ Dickie eyed Max’s outfit, a perfectly serviceable suit and tie, and shuddered extravagantly. ‘I see ’e needs one!’
‘It’s the first date tonight,’ Allegra said. ‘He’s meeting Darcy King for cocktails at Xubu.’
Xubu, as Max had heard at length, was the latest hot ticket, the place to see and be seen, and Allegra had been desperate to go. Fortunately—for her, if not for Max—Darcy King’s celebrity had opened the doors and Allegra was delighted.
