The Best Of The Year - Modern Romance 2016. Кейт Хьюит
She fiddled on her computer, checking her in and ticketing her bag at the same time.
‘Not soon enough,’ Theo answered on Alexa’s behalf. ‘The engagement ring is in the process of being altered. Who knows...? We might tie the knot even before the diamond is on your finger—mightn’t we, my darling?’
His low, throaty husk made her blood heat and she stared at the woman with a glassy smile.
‘Maybe not,’ she said gently. ‘I don’t think my mother would stand for that. She’s a stickler for tradition,’ Alexa expanded chirpily, ‘and by tradition I mean taking her time over the wedding arrangements! None of this crazy sprinting up the aisle!’
But then the sooner they tied the knot, the sooner they would untie it. It wasn’t a case of delaying something in the hope that it might disappear altogether if the delay was long enough. No such luck.
‘Speaking of diamonds...’ Theo told her as they headed towards the first class lounge and away from the chaos of the tax-free shopping area, which was packed.
‘Were we speaking of diamonds?’ Alexa used the pretence of stopping to peer into one of the shop windows to disengage herself from his embrace.
‘I’ve brought something for you...’
He left that teaser hanging in the air as they reached the lounge and were waved through towards a couple of cosy chairs, with a table in front of them on which a few business magazines were fanned out.
‘Have you? Alexa looked at him suspiciously. ‘What?’
Theo laughed and crossed his legs. ‘When are you going to stop fighting me? I’ve never met anyone with more of an appetite for arguing.’
‘As I’ve told you before—you’re the only one I argue with.’
‘Sign of a vibrant, lively relationship...’
‘It’s a sign of two people who don’t get along,’ Alexa corrected him. ‘Which is probably why you’ve never argued with any of the women you’ve been out with. And I’m sure they’ve all been vibrant, lively relationships!’
Theo cocked his head to one side and appeared to give her statement a great deal of serious thought.
‘Yes,’ he agreed eventually, ‘I suppose there’s been a certain amount of liveliness in the women I’ve dated...’
‘And no arguments,’ Alexa persisted, drawn to prolong the conversation and prove a point. ‘I can’t imagine any of your supermodels arguing with you.’
‘It’s true.’ Theo threw his hand up in a gesture that implied rueful but graceful defeat. ‘I don’t like argumentative women.’
‘So it’s a good thing that we don’t have to like one another, isn’t it?’
She had felt just the merest flash of hurt—because who enjoyed being told that they weren’t liked? Especially when his job of pretending that he did indeed like and fancy her was so polished and so convincing. And especially when she had grudgingly been forced to concede that she had become just another member of the long list of women who found him physically compelling.
Who wanted to fancy a guy who didn’t even like them?
Theo didn’t bother to get involved further in a conversation he knew wouldn’t end up going anywhere, because he was pretty sure that when it came to arguments there was a mighty one brewing like a storm just over the horizon.
It would certainly pay to broach that thorny subject as soon as possible and get it out of the way. Give her the duration of the flight to assimilate and accept.
He grunted something that might have been anything when it came to a response and Alexa banked down a sigh of frustration.
‘What is it that you’ve brought me?’ she reminded him briskly.
‘I’ll show you when we’re on the plane,’ Theo said, because there could be no available exit door when they were twenty thousand miles up in the air. ‘Your bag looks heavy. What have you got in it? Heavy club for beating me over the head?’
‘I’m glad you think this is funny,’ Alexa told him coldly.
Theo’s lips thinned. ‘Lighten up, Alexa. Do you take everything in life so seriously?’
‘This isn’t just any little thing.’
‘As I’ve said to you on a number of occasions, it’s inevitable—so why don’t you just kick back? Or is that something you don’t quite know how to do?’
He watched the slow colour crawl into her face. Hard-working, diligent, involved in the caring profession, pointedly making sure to avoid things she considered frivolous... In her own way, it was a statement of rebellion against her privileged background. She had bucked the tide of every other woman in her social circle, who would have settled into a life of pampered predictability and been married by the age of twenty-one to someone not very different from themselves.
The people he had met where she volunteered her services were all very nice indeed, but none of them had struck him as a bundle of fun.
So did she ever kick back?
‘I kick back.’ Alexa heard defiance in her voice.
‘Who with? I haven’t met the people you used to work with...what were they like?’
‘Lots of fun,’ she told him edgily. ‘But you’d probably think they were dull as dishwater.’
‘Why?’
‘Because they’re not the sort of people who think that “fun” is all about nightclubs and being in the public eye.’
‘And have you? Ever?’
‘Have I ever what?’
They were having a perfectly normal conversation, but Alexa still felt as though she was trying to find a foothold on thin ice. Maybe because when she was in his company, try as she might, she never seemed to feel normal.
‘Thought nightclubs and being in the public eye are fun? Scrap the being in the public eye. No one in their right mind considers that fun.’
Although, if he were to be honest, most of the women he had dated in the past had basked in the glare of paparazzi flashbulbs.
‘I’m not a nightclub type of person,’ Alexa muttered, wondering how the conversation had managed to get here. ‘When I meet up with friends we all prefer to go to places where we can actually hear ourselves think.’
Theo had a vision of a group of earnest individuals, solving the problems of the world over cups of espresso. She was positively the last sort of person he would ever have been drawn to normally. Frankly, he had little use for people who solved the world’s problems over cups of coffee. If the problem was too big to solve, then why waste time talking about it? And if it was solvable then why not just get out there and solve it? Cut out the middle man, which came in the form of pointless discussion.
On the other hand he had watched her in that shelter place of hers—had seen her interaction with the people there and for a fleeting instant had actually caught himself thinking of the supermodels who had graced his arm in the past with a certain amount of distaste.
‘And those friends would be your colleagues at work?’
‘I’ve kept in touch with a couple of school friends,’ she admitted. Both were married, and one was the proud mother of a baby boy. ‘Why are we talking about this anyway?’
She heard the announcement of their flight over the Tannoy. Travelling first class, she knew they would be the last to board the plane, and sure enough, after a brisk ten-minute walk, they were taking their very comfortable seats in the first class section.
‘Books,’ she said, and Theo shot her a quizzical look as he made himself comfortable.