did you first realise that you were in love with me?
He couldn’t be in love with Allegra, Max thought in panic. There was some mistake. He’d put his hand up to momentary lust perhaps, but love? No, no, no, no. She was pretending, Max reminded himself with a touch of desperation. She didn’t really believe he was in love with her.
So why had her words settled into place in his head as if they belonged there?
Allegra turned in her seat so that Bob and Karen couldn’t see her give him a warning dead-eye look. ‘Was it when I let you paint my toenails?’ she asked.
Paint...? What? Max’s brows snapped together until he realised belatedly that she was trying to prod him into responding. God knew what his expression had looked like as he’d sat there, stunned at the realisation that he had, in fact, fallen in love with Allegra.
Fool that he was.
But not so foolish he would humiliate himself by letting anyone guess, Allegra least of all.
Max recovered himself with an effort. ‘I think it was more when I realised how distraught you were at the idea of me going to Shofrar,’ he said, pretending to consider the matter. He looked at Bob and Karen. ‘It was only then I understood just what I meant to her.’
There was a whack on his arm. ‘I was not distraught!’ Allegra said indignantly.
‘You were weeping and wailing and begging me not to go, remember?’
‘You are such a big fibber!’ she protested, but she was laughing too.
‘I’m a fibber? What was that about me painting your toenails?’
‘I never cry,’ she insisted to Karen, who looked from one to the other in amusement.
‘Well, however you fell in love, I can just tell that you two are perfect together!’
‘We think so, don’t we, sweetheart?’ That was Allegra again, playing it for all it was worth. She leant confidingly towards Karen. ‘Of course, Max can be a bit grumpy at times, but I know he adores me.’
The little minx.
Fortunately Bob chose that moment to ask Max about the project he was working on and Max seized on the chance to drag the conversation back to safe territory.
But Karen was asking about the wedding, and Max found it harder than he’d thought to concentrate on engineering while beside him Allegra had launched into a vivid description of an imaginary wedding ceremony, her dress, what the bridesmaids would be wearing, how the tables would be decorated, and a host of other details that Max had never even considered in connection with a wedding.
He listened incredulously with one ear. Where did Allegra get all this stuff from? Oh, God, now she was sketching outfits on the back of an envelope she’d dug out of her jewelled bag and Karen was oohing and aahing.
‘Oh, that’s darling!’ she exclaimed, and in spite of himself Max craned his neck to see what Allegra had drawn. There she stood in a slender dress with a low wide neckline and that was unmistakably him next to her, dressed in a morning suit and a flowery waistcoat.
‘Over my dead body,’ he muttered in Allegra’s ear, and she pressed her lips together but he could see her body shaking with suppressed giggles.
‘Women and weddings, huh?’ said Bob as Max caught his eye. ‘Take my advice, just go along with whatever they want.’
‘I guess your mom will want to be involved in the wedding plans too?’ Karen said to Allegra, ignoring the men.
‘Er, yes.’ Max could see Allegra trying to imagine poring over table decorations with Flick. ‘Yes, she will, of course, but really it’s just between Max and me, isn’t it?’
‘Quite right,’ said Bob, ‘and the sooner you get on with it the better, am I right, Max? But I’m not sure you’re going to have time to get married before you go out to Shofrar. You’ll have to come back for the wedding.’
Max looked at Bob and then at Allegra, whose face lit with excitement. ‘Does that mean...?’ she asked Bob, and he nodded and smiled.
‘Sure. Of course Max gets the job.’
Allegra squealed with excitement and flung her arms around Max. ‘Oh, Max, you got it! You’re going to Shofrar!’
Her cheek was pressed against his, and unthinkingly his arms closed around her, pulling her tight. Bob and Karen were watching indulgently and when Allegra turned her head and smiled, it seemed the most natural thing in the world to kiss her.
Her mouth was soft and lusciously curved and so close it would have been rude not to, in fact. And it would look good, Max thought hazily, unable to wrench his gaze from her lips. The Laskovskis were expecting him to kiss Allegra. That was what engaged couples did when they got good news. It would seem odd if he didn’t kiss her.
One hand slid up her spine to the nape of her neck. For one still moment he looked straight into the deep, mossy green of Allegra’s eyes and all rational thought evaporated. There was nothing but her warmth, her scent, her mouth.
Her mouth.
He couldn’t resist any longer. He’d forgotten why he needed to, forgotten everything but the need to seal the gap between them. He drew her head towards him—or perhaps she leant closer; Max never knew—and angled his lips against hers, and the taste and the touch of her blew his senses apart so that he could almost have sworn that the restaurant swung wildly around them.
She was warm and responsive, pliant against him, and their mouths fitted together as if they were meant for each other. The astonishing rightness of it rose in his chest and surged through him like a tide, blocking out doubts, blocking out reason, blocking out everything that wasn’t Allegra: the scent of her, the feel of her, the sweetness of her.
Afterwards, Max calculated that the kiss couldn’t have lasted more than a few seconds, but at the time it seemed to stretch to infinity and beyond. He never knew where he found the strength to pull away, but somehow he had drawn back and was staring into her eyes once more. The lovely green was dark and dazed, and her expression was as stunned as his must have been.
‘Yep,’ said Bob to Karen, ‘the sooner those two get married the better, I’d say.’
Desperately, Max tried to pull himself together. His blood was pounding, which was crazy. It had just been a kiss, hardly more than a peck on the lips. There was no reason for his heart to be throbbing still like that, for his lungs to have forgotten how to function.
He had to get a grip, focus on the job. He had what he wanted. He was going to Shofrar to be a project manager, just like he had planned. He ought to be elated, not thinking about the way Allegra’s words were ringing in his ears: You’re going to Shofrar, she had exclaimed in delight.
You’re going, not we’re going.
They were all picking up their glasses and Bob was toasting Max’s promotion. Max stretched his mouth into a smile.
You, not we.
That was how it should be, Max told himself. In a few weeks, he would get
