shook his head. ‘I’ve got to be out of my mind,’ he murmured, and the oblique agreement made Laura fling her arms around him.
‘Oh, thank you. You’re a wonderful man.’
‘Don’t overdo it,’ he advised, and shook his head again. ‘I know I’m going to live to regret this.’
‘No, you aren’t. This is the opportunity we’ve been waiting for. When are they expecting you?’
‘Next Wednesday evening,’ he revealed, and tried one last time to dissuade her. ‘Are you sure you’re doing the right thing?’
Laura pressed a hand over her anxiously beating heart. ‘No, but I’m going to do it anyway.’
Realising she was not about to change her mind, Jonathan bowed to the inevitable. ‘I’ll pick you up at your apartment around seven.’
‘You’re not going to tell them I’m coming, are you?’ she asked as the thought struck her, but Jonathan shook his head.
‘I think I’d prefer to surprise them. They might shoot the messenger for bringing bad news,’ he told her dryly, rounding his desk and locking away in a drawer the file he had been reading. ‘Are you ready for supper now?’ Collecting his overcoat from the stand by the door, he draped it over his arm.
‘Won’t our table have gone?’ Laura reminded him, but he grinned.
‘Nope. I remembered what happened the last time I took you to an opening and ordered the table for an hour later. If we hurry we should just about make it,’ he revealed, taking her arm and guiding her from the office.
‘My, what a clever boy you are!’
‘If I was that clever, I wouldn’t be letting you persuade me to set the cat among the pigeons.’
‘I’ma very docile cat,’ Laura murmured sweetly.
‘Hmm. Tell that to the pigeons!’
‘WARM enough?’
Laura sighed and stretched her toes towards the warm air coming from the heater. The car was a luxury model. Jonathan never drove anything but the best.
‘Mmm. It’s sending me to sleep,’ she murmured. It had been a long day, and the traffic leaving the city for the holiday season had made it seem endless. They had left it behind now, though, and progress was quicker.
‘Why don’t you nap for a while? We’ve still got some way to go,’ Jonathan suggested, sparing her a glance which brought a smile to his lips, before concentrating once more on his driving.
Laura liked the sound of that. She hadn’t slept much the previous night for thinking of the visit ahead of her. Not that she regretted her decision to come. She didn’t. However, she knew it wasn’t going to be pleasant walking into a place where she knew she wasn’t wanted. Consequently she had slept only fitfully, and now her eyes felt gritty from lack of sleep.
‘You’d better wake me before we get there. I don’t want to turn up looking like something the cat dragged in,’ she drawled wryly, making herself as comfortable as the seat belt would allow.
‘You never look anything less than lovely to me,’ Jonathan responded gallantly, and she smiled without opening her eyes.
‘You always say the right thing. It’s a wonder some woman hasn’t snapped you up before now.’
There was an infinitesimal pause before he responded. ‘All the best women are already taken,’ he said flatly, and Laura heard the soft sigh which followed. She didn’t look at him, but rather belatedly she did begin to wonder about Jonathan’s love life. Could he be in love with somebody who was married to somebody else? The thought saddened her, for if that was so he was doomed to unhappiness.
‘Uh-oh!’
The muffled exclamation brought her eyes open again, in time to see the first snowflakes begin to fall. She sat up, forgetting all about sleep.
‘It’s snowing!’ she cried in delight.
Jonathan snorted. ‘Just what we needed,’ he said grumpily. He had never made any attempt to hide his dislike of driving in wintry conditions.
‘I love snow. It makes everything look clean, bright and magical.’
He rubbed at the windscreen. ‘You wouldn’t think it so wonderful if you got snowed in.’
Laura laughed ruefully. ‘Probably not, but the child in me refuses to think of frozen pipes and no electricity.’
‘Perhaps you should move here. There’s no shortage of snow in Vermont in winter.’
Laura sat back with a sigh. ‘Strange, I always wanted to see Vermont, but I never imagined visiting under these circumstances. It’s funny how things turn out.’
‘Hilarious.’
‘Don’t be a grouch,’ she reproved lightly. ‘Tell me who else will be there besides us.’ It would be as well to know beforehand.
‘Did anyone ever tell you you’re a nag?’ he complained before complying with her request. ‘Let me see. Besides Maxine there will be Stella and her husband Ian Nevin. Then Philip and his latest girlfriend,’ Jonathan enlarged for her. ‘Oh, and Quinn, of course.’
Quinn? Her heart executed a crazy lurch, and her mouth suddenly became a parched desert. Alarm shot through her. She hadn’t expected him to be one of the party. Her mind flew back to those dizzying few seconds when he had touched her hand, and she shivered. The sensation which had ripped its way through her had been incredible. The sheer intensity of it was still shocking in retrospect, so that she hadn’t been able to forget it. She hadn’t been able to forget him, either. Much to her chagrin.
He kept slipping into her mind at the most inconvenient times. The damned man seemed intent on proving the adage: once seen, never forgotten. It was driving her crazy. She swore he was haunting her. His name popped out of the newspaper every time she opened one, and just that morning she had seen a tall, rugged man wearing an Aran sweater walk into the studio and, for one electrifying moment, she had actually thought it was him! When it turned out to be a complete stranger, her sense of disappointment had come as an unpleasant shock. She had had to tell herself quite categorically that she did not want to see him before she could relax again.
Now, apparently, he was to be at the house for the holiday, and the knowledge took the bottom out of her stomach. She groaned. This was ridiculous. Of all the juvenile reactions! Especially as she despised the man. She really had to get a grip.
‘Why “of course”?’ she asked a few minutes later and Jonathan frowned, not taking his eyes from the road where the snow was beginning to settle.
‘What was that?’
‘Why did you say Quinn will be there “of course”?’ she repeated calmly, though her pulse rate was anything but calm.
