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Jessie tiptoed into the bedroom, where a sound-asleep Emily had kicked off her bedclothes. The evening was quite warm, so Jessie switched the overhead ceiling fan on to the slow setting, then pulled the top sheet up around Emily and tucked her in. Emily had not long given up her cot for a single bed and looked such a dot in the larger bed.
Pressing a kiss to her temple, Jessie straightened before just standing there and staring down at her daughter.
Her heart filled with love as it always did when she looked down upon her child.
That was what had surprised Jessie the most when she’d become a mother. The instant and totally unconditional love which had consumed her from the moment she’d held her baby in her arms.
Had her own mother felt like that when she’d had her?
Jessie didn’t think so. She suspected that any love her mother had had for her had been overshadowed by shame.
Jessie pushed this distressing thought aside and bent to stroke Emily’s dark curls back from her forehead before planting another gentle kiss on her daughter’s cheek.
‘Sleep tight, sweetie,’ she whispered. ‘Mummy won’t be long.
‘Thank you so much for staying here and minding her, Dora,’ Jessie said on returning to the combined kitchen and living room.
‘My pleasure,’ Dora said, already settled on the sofa in front of the television.
‘You know where the tea and biscuits are.’
‘I’ll be fine. There’s a good movie on tonight at eight-thirty. That’s only ten minutes off. You’d better get going. And for Pete’s sake, take a taxi home after you’re finished. It’s too dangerous on the train late at night, especially on a Friday night.’
‘Hopefully, I won’t be too late.’
Jessie didn’t want to waste any of the travel expenses Jack had given her. She wanted to make as much profit out of this rotten evening as she could. Why waste thirty dollars on a cab?
‘Jessie Denton,’ Dora said sternly. ‘You promise me you’ll take a taxi home.’
Jessie gave her a narrow-eyed look from under her long lashes. ‘I will if I need to, Dora.’
‘You can be very stubborn, do you know that?’
Jessie grinned. ‘Yep. But you love me just the same. Take care.’ And, giving Dora a peck on the cheek, she swept up her bag and headed for the door.
CHAPTER TWO
KANE sat at the bar, nursing a double Scotch, and pondering the perversities of life.
He still could not believe what his brother had just told him: that he was miserable in his marriage and that he spent every Friday night drinking here at this bar instead of going home to his wife and children. Curtis even confessed to going into the office on the weekend sometimes to escape the tension and arguments at home.
Kane could not have been more shocked. There he’d been these past few years, envying Curtis for his choice of wife, his two gorgeous children and his seemingly perfect family!
The truth, it seemed, was a far cry from the fantasy world Kane had woven around his twin brother’s home life. Apparently, Lisa was far from content with being a stay-at-home mum. She was bored and lonely for adult company during the day. On top of that, two-year-old Joshua had turned into a right terror this past year. Four-year-old Cathy threw tantrums all the time and wouldn’t go to bed at night. Lisa could not cope and their sex life had been reduced to zero.
Curtis, who was never at his best at the art of communication, had started staying away from home more and more, and Lisa was now giving him the silent treatment.
He was terrified she was thinking of leaving him and taking the kids with her. Which had prompted his call of desperation to his brother tonight.
Kane, who’d been working late at the office, solving the problem of a defecting designer, had come running to the rescue—as he always did when his twin brother was hurt or threatened in any way. He’d been coming to Curtis’s rescue since they were toddlers.
‘I love my family and don’t want to lose them,’ Curtis had cried into his beer ten minutes earlier. ‘Tell me what to do, Kane. You’re the man with all the solutions. Tell me what to do!’
Kane had rolled his eyes at this. OK, he could understand why Curtis thought he could wave a magic wand and fix his problems with a few, well-chosen words. He had made a fortune teaching people how to be successful in getting what they wanted out of their working life. His motivational seminars drew huge crowds. His fee as an after-dinner speaker was outrageous. His best-selling book, Winning At Work, had been picked up in most countries overseas.
Earlier this year he’d gone on a whirlwind tour in the US to promote the book’s release, and sales there had been stupendous.
His hectic schedule in America had drained him, however, both physically and emotionally, and since his return he’d cut back considerably on his speaking engagements. He’d been thinking of taking a long holiday when his friend Harry Wilde had asked him to look after his small but very successful advertising agency during December whilst he went on a cruise with his wife and kids.
Kane had jumped at the chance. A change was as good as a holiday. And he was really enjoying the challenge. It had been interesting to see if his theories could be applied to any management job. So far, so good.
Unfortunately, his strategies for success in the professional world didn’t necessarily translate into success in one’s personal life. His own, especially. With one failed marriage behind him and no new relationship in sight, he was possibly not the best man to give his brother marital advice.
But he knew one thing. You never solved any problem by sitting at a bar, downing one beer after another. You certainly never solved anything, running away from life.
Of course, that had always been Curtis’s nature, to take the easiest course, to run away from trouble. He’d always been the shy twin. The less assertive twin. The one who needed protecting. Although just as intelligent, Curtis had never had Kane’s confidence, or drive, or ambition. His choice to become an accountant had not surprised Kane.
Still, Kane understood that it could not have been easy being his twin brother. He knew he could be a hard act to follow, with his I-can-do-anything personality.
But it was high time Curtis stood up and faced life head-on, along with his responsibilities. He had a lovely wife and two great kids who were having a hard time for whatever reason and really needed him. Regardless of what a lot of those new relationship gurus touted, Kane believed a husband was supposed to be the head of his family. The rock. The person they could always count on.
Curtis was acting like a coward.
Not that Kane said that. Rule one in his advice to management executives was never to criticise or put down their staff or their colleagues. Praise and encouragement worked much better than pointing out an individual’s shortcomings.
In light of that theory, Kane had delivered Curtis one of his best motivational lectures ever, telling his brother what a great bloke he was. A great brother, a great son, a great husband and a great father. He even threw in that Curtis was a great accountant. Didn’t he do his brother’s highly complicated tax return each year?
Kane reassured Curtis that his wife loved him and no way would she ever leave him.
Unless she thought he didn’t love her back. Which Lisa had to be thinking, Kane reckoned.
At this point he sent his brother off home to tell his wife that he loved her to death and that he was sorry that he hadn’t been there for her when she needed him. He was to vow passionately that he would be in future, and what could he do to help?
‘And when Lisa falls, weeping, into your arms,’ Kane had added, ‘whip her into bed and make love to her as you obviously haven’t made love to her in a long time!’
When Curtis still hesitated, Kane also promised to drop over the next day to give his brother some moral support, and to provide some more proactive suggestions which would make his wife and kids a lot happier.
Hopefully, by then, he could think of some.
One divorce in their family was more than enough! Their parents would have a fit if Curtis and Lisa broke up as well.
Kane shook his head and swirled his drink, staring down into the pale amber depths and wondering just why he’d married Natalie in the first place. For a guy who was supposed to be smart, he’d been very dumb that time. Their marriage had been doomed from the start.
‘Hi, honey.’
Kane’s head whipped around to find a very good-looking blonde sliding seductively onto the bar stool next to him. Everything she had—and there was plenty of it—was on display. For a split-second, Kane felt his male hormones rumble a bit. Till he looked into her eyes.
They were pretty enough, but empty. Kane could never stay interested in women with empty eyes.
Natalie had had intelligent eyes.
Pity she hadn’t wanted children.
‘You look as if you could do with some company,’ the blonde added before curling her finger at the barman and ordering herself a glass of champagne.
‘Bad week?’ she directed back at Kane.
‘Nope. Good week. Not so great an evening,’ he replied, still thinking of his brother’s problems.
‘Loneliness is lousy,’ she said.
‘I’m not lonely,’ he refuted. ‘Just alone.’
‘Not any more.’
‘Maybe I want to be alone.’
‘No one wants to be alone, lover.’
The blonde’s words struck home. She was right. No one did. Him included. But divorce—even an amicable one—made a man wary. It had been fifteen months since he’d separated from Natalie, three months since their divorce had become final. And he still hadn’t found anyone new. He hadn’t even succumbed to the many offers he’d had for one-night stands.
Women were always letting him know they were available for the night, or a weekend, or whatever. But he just wasn’t interested in that kind of encounter any more. He’d been hoping to find what he thought Curtis had. A woman who wasn’t wrapped up in her career. A woman who was happy to put her job aside for a few years at least to become a career wife, and mother.
Now he wasn’t so sure if that creature existed. The sort of women he found attractive were invariably involved with their jobs. They were smart, sassy, sexy girls who worked hard and played hard. They didn’t want to become housewives and mothers.
‘Come on, lighten up a bit,’ the blonde said. ‘Get yourself another drink, for pity’s sake. That one’s history.’
Kane knew he probably shouldn’t. He hadn’t had anything to eat tonight and the whisky was going straight to his head. He wasn’t interested in the blonde, but neither did he want to go home to an empty house. He’d have one more drink with her, then make his excuses and go find a place in town to eat.
CHAPTER THREE
THE bar Curtis Marshall frequented every Friday night was called the Cellar, so Jessie shouldn’t have been surprised to find that it was downstairs from street level. Narrow, steep stairs. Stairs which made her walk oh, so carefully in her four-inch-high heels. The last thing she wanted was to fall flat on her face.
The music reached her ears only seconds before the smoke.
Jazz.
Not Jessie’s favourite form of music. But what did it matter? She wasn’t there to enjoy herself. She was there to do a job.
The bouncer standing by the open door gave her the once-over as she slowly negotiated the last few steps.
‘Very nice,’ he muttered as she walked past him.
She didn’t answer. She straightened her shoulders and moved further into the smoke haze, her eyes slowly becoming accustomed to the dimmer lighting as they scanned the not-so-crowded room. Nine o’clock, she reasoned, was between times. Most of the Friday after-work drinkers had departed, and the serious weekend party animals had not yet arrived.
She’d never been to this particular bar before. She’d never heard of it. It was Jack who’d informed her that it had a reputation as a pick-up joint.
The décor was nineteen-twenties speak-easy style, with lots of wood and leather and brass. Booths lined the walls, with tables and chairs filling every other available space. The band occupied one corner, with a very small dance floor in front of it.
The bar itself was against the far wall, semicircular in shape, graced by a dozen or so wooden-based, leather-topped stools. A long mirror ran along the back behind the bottle shelves, which gave Jessie reflected glimpses of the faces of people sitting at the bar.
There were only half a dozen.
She recognised her target straight away. He was sitting in the middle, with a blonde sitting next to him on his left. There were several vacant stools to his right. As Jessie stood there, watching them, she saw the blonde lean over and say something to him. He motioned to the barman, who came over, temporarily blocking Jessie’s view of the target’s face in the mirror.
Had the blonde asked him to buy her a drink? Was he right at this moment doing exactly what his wife suspected him of?
Jessie realised with a rush of relief that maybe she wouldn’t have to flirt with the creep after all. If she got over there right now, she could collect evidence of his chatting up some other woman without having to belittle herself.
Jessie’s heart pounded as she headed for the bar, nerves cramping her stomach. She still hated doing this, even second-hand.
Think of the money, she told herself as she slid up on the vacant stool two to the right of the target. Think of Emily’s beautiful, beaming face on Christmas morning when she finds that Santa has brought her exactly what she asked for.
The self-lecture helped a little. Some composure returned by the time Jessie placed her bag down on the polished wooden bar-top. Very casually she extracted the mobile phone, pretended to check her text messages, turned on the video then put it down in a position which would catch what was going on to her left, both visually and verbally.
‘Thanks,’ the blonde purred when the barman put a glass of champagne in front of her. ‘So what will we drink to, handsome?’
When the barman moved away, Jessie was able to watch the target’s face again in the mirror behind the bar.
There was no doubt he was handsome, more handsome than in his photograph. More mature-looking, too. Maybe that photo in her bag was a couple of years old, because his hair was different as well. Not different in colour. It was still a mid-brown. But in place of the longer waves and lock flopping across his forehead was a short-back-and-sides look, with spikes on top.
The style brought his blue eyes more into focus.
That was another thing that looked different. His eyes. In the photo they’d seemed a baby-blue, with a dreamy expression. In reality, his eyes were an icy blue. And not soft at all.
They glittered as he smiled wryly and swirled the remains of his drink. He hadn’t noticed her arrival as yet.
‘To marriage,’ he said, and lifted his glass in a toast.
‘Marriage!’ the blonde scorned. ‘That’s one seriously out-of-date institution. I’d rather drink to divorce.’
‘Divorce is a blight on our society,’ he said sharply. ‘I won’t drink to divorce.’
‘Sex, then. Let’s drink to sex.’ And she slid her glass against his in a very suggestive fashion.
Jessie, who’d stayed surreptitiously watching him in the mirror behind the bar, saw his head turn slowly towards the blonde, a drily amused expression on his face.
‘Sweetheart, I think you’ve picked the wrong guy to share a drink with. I’m sorry if I’ve given you the wrong impression, but I’m not in the market for what you’re looking for tonight.’
Jessie almost fell off her stool. What was this? A man with some honour? Had Dora been right about Mr Marshall after all?
‘You sure?’ the blonde persisted with a sultry smile playing on her red-painted mouth.
‘Positive.’
‘Your loss, lover,’ she said and, taking her glass of champagne, slid off her stool and sashayed over to sit at a table close to the band. She wasn’t by herself for more than ten seconds, before a guy who’d been sitting further down the bar had taken his beer with him to join her.
Jessie glanced back into the mirror to find that her target had finally noticed her presence, and was staring at her. When their eyes connected in the glass her heart reacted in a way which it hadn’t in years. It actually jumped, then fluttered, then flipped right over.
