She’d quietly slipped out of the canteen and headed for her office, deciding to take the stairs, because, well… strange things seemed to be happening to her in lifts these days.
She’d just pushed through the fire door and out onto the landing when she realised someone was coming through behind her. ‘Hey!’
There was no need to turn around to see who it was, but she did anyway.
‘Look, I just wanted to say sorry. About earlier. And I really hope that wasn’t some secret boyfriend, because if it was, then I’ll expect him to be waiting outside to kick my arse later.’
‘Not my boyfriend. That was my friend, Noah.’
‘Ah, the best friend you told me about – the one that people are constantly suggesting you should hook up with.’
Tress grinned. ‘Something like that.’
Rex leaned back against the banister, arms crossed, that gorgeous laconic smile on his face. ‘Well, I thoroughly recommend that you definitely do not get together. Not under any circumstances. In fact, I recommend that you consider a new relationship with someone far more exciting.’
Okay, they were flirting. She could do this. Somewhere in the basement of her dating game memories, there was a handbook she’d last read many years ago.
‘Oh really? And do you have any suggestions as to who that should be?’
He nodded thoughtfully. ‘One or two.’
Tress’s turn to cultivate a thoughtful response now. ‘Okay, well, if you send me their dating profiles and headshots, I’ll take a look.’
That made him laugh, and at the same time he reached over and gave the waistband of her trousers a playful tug towardshim. She didn’t resist. When they were toe to toe, he leaned down and kissed her. For a glorious second, there was a rush of heat around her body, until she remembered where they were and quickly broke away and stepped back.
‘I’m sorry. I can’t. Not here. If anyone saw us, it would be…’ It took her a few seconds to find the words. ‘It would be a nightmare for me. It would put me right in the centre of attention, and that’s somewhere I make it my life mission to avoid.’
‘You’re right,’ he said and, to her relief, didn’t make another move forwards. ‘Although, I will point out that no one uses the stairs in this place.’
She felt herself begin to relax, now that they were just two colleagues having a chat in a stairwell.
‘So, I have a problem…’ he continued, and she could sense from his tone that he was playing with her.
‘Really? What’s that?’
‘Well, despite having hordes of fans waiting outside for me every day, and even though I get at least a dozen naked pictures sent to me on a weekly basis, it would appear that I’m not all that special after all. You see, I asked this woman out… She’s gorgeous, you’d like her…’ The twinkle in his eye was making her blush. ‘And she took ages to finally agree that she’d go on a date with me next Saturday night. But now, I find myself unable to stop thinking about her, so I’m thinking that perhaps I’d like to take her out tonight as well. What do you think? Any chance she’d say yes?’
The prickles of anxiety that had been coming and going all day came bristling right back. Tonight? No. She couldn’t. It was Buddy’s birthday today. It was also the anniversary of a piece of her heart being broken off forever. Tonight, she wanted pyjamas, she wanted wine, she wanted snacks, she wanted back-to-back episodes ofProperty Brothers, and she wantedto indulge in alternating between feeling grateful for her son, feeling furious with his father, and being heartbroken that he was gone. Oh, and she planned to have a good cry at least once. That was a whole load of emotional pendulum swings there, and she felt that she had every right to allow herself to sit in her feelings, given that she’d spent a year trying to mask them.
But then…
Her thoughts flicked to the phone call earlier, with Nancy offering to spend the night babysitting Buddy, and saying that he’d be in bed by seven o’clock anyway. That part was definitely true.
She then heard Val and Nancy’s voices, giving her a stern lecture about living her life, seizing moments and getting back on the relationship horse. This wasn’t the particular stallion they had in mind, but at least it was a trot in the right direction.
Tress made a quick calculation. If she left work now, she could go home and work there for a few hours, just as she usually did on a Friday. That way, when Val and Nancy brought Buddy back from the petting zoo, she could spend some time with her son and give him his dinner. Then, when he went to bed, she could park the idea of wine, home-makeover shows and a huge bucket of self-pity, and instead, say yes to the handsome, successful man who was standing in front of her right now, asking her to go out with him. The same one she’d snogged the face off earlier in the day. And maybe this time, it wouldn’t feel so fricking awkward and she’d actually relax enough to enjoy it. Sod it, she might even shave her legs in case she got lucky, because, after all, she didn’t owe anyone any kind of self-restraint. Hadn’t her husband been off with his mistress on the day he died? Well, she damn well deserved to allow herself to rejoin the human race and have a bit of fun too.
‘Did I also mention that the woman I asked out takes a really long time to make a decision and when she’s thinking really hard about something, she gets the cutest little lines on her forehead?’
And, sod it again, she was damn well getting Botox.
‘Okay.’
‘Okay?’
‘Yes. The old hag with the wrinkles on her forehead will go out with you. Tonight. But tell me where I’ve to be and then run before I change my mind because I’m finding this all mildly terrifying.’
‘Yasssss!’ He punched the air. ‘And you don’t have to be anywhere, because I’ll come and collect you.’
