by Jill Mansell
“I know what you must do. We’re having a small party here tonight, to celebrate Jack’s birthday. Nothing too elaborate, just drinks and a few friends, but it’ll be fun. Will you come along?”
“Really? I’d love to!” Imogen was delighted.
“And do bring a partner.” Cass hesitated, glancing at Imogen’s left hand. “Boyfriend, husband…whatever.”
“No, I’m not married.” Imogen, having intercepted the glance, pulled a wry face. “I haven’t been lucky enough to find the right man yet.” Then, with a hint of mischief, she added, “At least not one to match up to my expectations. I need someone like your Jack.”
* * *
“Oh, for God’s sake!” Jack groaned when Cass told him that afternoon what she had done. “Why?”
“I like her.” Cass was lying in the bath, watching his reflection in the mirror as he shaved. “You’ve invited that chap you met at the Groucho last week, haven’t you? ‘He’s a good bloke,’ you said, so you invited him along. Well, that’s exactly what I’ve done. If you meet new people and you like them, you keep in touch,” she explained pointedly. “It’s called making friends.”
He shot her a suspicious look over his shoulder. “You rehearsed that.”
“I needed to,” Cass protested. “You know what you’re like when you start arguing. Besides…”
“Besides what?”
“Well, I half invited her so she could see how nice you can be.” Cass bit her lip, hiding her smile. “You were so vile this morning. I wanted her to know you had a good side too.”
Chapter 4
It was a warm, still night. As the sky darkened from violet to indigo, the stars multiplied. Imogen, pausing for a moment at the foot of the drive as her cab reversed and pulled away, admired the picture before her of a large, comfortably sprawling Victorian house with Gothic features and all its windows lit up like an Advent calendar. She could hear music and laughter too, emanating from the back of the house where the party had evidently spilled out into the garden.
Cass Mandeville had said eight thirty, and it was now almost ten, but as far as Imogen was concerned, it was always the best way for a girl arriving at a party on her own. By the time she turned up, all the ice breaking would have already been done, and everyone would be well enough into their third or fourth drinks to think nothing of introducing themselves to a complete stranger.
Imogen briefly checked herself over before setting off up the drive. Her hair, which she had put up into a chignon, felt OK. Bra straps hidden. The black, above-the-knee summer dress wasn’t tucked into her underwear at the back. And since her legs were bare, she didn’t have to worry about laddered stockings. As far as she could tell, everything was fine.
Just to make doubly sure and because it was what she always did before making an entrance, Imogen slid a bottle of what she thought of as her confidence booster out of her bag. She had barely gotten the top off before a screech of car tires sounded behind her. A dark car, being driven at ridiculous speed, zoomed up the drive and, with a blast on the horn, squealed to a sliding halt less than three inches from the backs of her knees.
“What the—” Shaken, Imogen wheeled around. It had all happened so suddenly. She could have been killed.
“Well, I’m sorry,” came an aggrieved male voice through the driver’s window as it slid noiselessly open, “but have your reflexes always been that slow? Didn’t you hear me coming up the drive?”
Imogen stared at the boy making such fun of her. As he spoke, he was using mock sign language, as if she really were deaf. He was smiling too, something he undoubtedly wouldn’t have been doing had she been a complete stranger encountered in the street. But she wasn’t; she was clearly an invited guest, and it didn’t do to lose one’s temper with a guest.
Likewise, if he had been a stranger, Imogen would have called him every name under the sun. But he wasn’t, so she held her tongue. He was Sean Mandeville, featured in the papers these days almost as often as his famous parents, and ripping the aerial off his stupid car to teach him a lesson wouldn’t be the done thing at all.
Instead, her fingers still resting against the dusty, midnight-blue hood of the BMW, Imogen took a steadying breath and said untruthfully, “I’m sorry. My fault.”
Sean wasn’t stupid. He grinned. “And I was in a hurry. We’re both pretty late. I don’t think we’ve met before.”
“If we’d met before,” Imogen replied smoothly, “you would have remembered.”
“I should certainly have remembered the smell.” He gave her a dark look. “Don’t take this personally, but is that really you?”
It was Imogen’s confidence booster, her almost full and jolly expensive bottle of Lancôme’s Trésor. The shock of almost being run over had catapulted it from her hand, and the bottle had hit one of the rocks bordering the graveled drive. The fumes, wafting heftily up through the still night air, surrounded the car like cyanide.
“Quick, get in.” As the passenger door opened, the driver’s window slid shut. “If we hurry, it can’t follow us. Who are you anyway? Tell me your name.”
* * *
Imogen wasn’t at all sure she liked him, but at least he was someone to walk in with. Sean Mandeville, with his flashing dark eyes and extraordinary good looks, was currently making quite a name for himself on the comedy circuit, and if his name and natural talent were contributing factors, then so were those looks, for the simple reason that seriously attractive stand-up comedians—men capable of making a girl simultaneously drool and laugh—were as rare as hens’ teeth. And if Sean was no funnier than at least a dozen of his contemporaries at Comedy Inc., the Soho club that had given him his first regular spot, he was infinitely more bankable because all the girls and most of the gays were so besotted with him. His gigs were always packed.
“We bumped into each other outside,” Sean told his mother as Cass greeted Imogen with a delighted kiss on the cheek.
“I’m so glad you were able to come! Sean, darling, fetch Imogen a drink. Now, where’s Jack disappeared to? Ah…Jack, come and say hello, and try to do it nicely this time. Imogen, this is my ancient husband, Jack. Jack, Imogen Trent.”
“Hello.”
No friendly kiss on the cheek from ancient Jack, thought Imogen. Reaching into her bag, she withdrew a dark-green envelope and a flat parcel, gift wrapped and beribboned in dark-green and gold.
“Happy birthday,” she said, handing them to him and wondering if maybe now he would have the grace to be embarrassed.
Jack’s dark eyes, however, betrayed no hint of apology. “What’s this?” He glanced at her. “Some kind of bribe? If you’re expecting me to change my mind and turn up for this photo session tomorrow, you’re out of luck. The answer’s still no.”
“Darling!” Cass visibly cringed. Jack was supposed to be making up for this morning’s rudeness, not compounding it.
“It’s OK.” Imogen shrugged. Then she added quietly, “And it wasn’t a bribe. Hi! didn’t pay for it. I bought the gift myself.” She watched him unwrap the unadorned, solid silver photograph frame. “I thought the lovely snap on your kitchen cupboard deserved it.”
“Oh, Imogen, you shouldn’t have,” Cass exclaimed. “It’s beautiful! Jack, isn’t it beautiful? Just perfect for that photo.”
“Perfect,” said Jack.
Imogen jumped as Sean materialized beside her.
“My father,” he stage-whispered, “has no shame.”
“Your father is beyond the pale.” Cass was beginning to despair. Imogen smiled to let her know it wasn’t her fault.
“Don’t flap.” Jack smiled too, but only just. “You think I’m in danger of hurting our guest’s feelings. She’s a journalist, Cass. Of sorts. Journalists don’t have feelings.”
“Some of them certainly don’t have manners,” Cass responded tartly. She wondered why Jack couldn’t let the
matter rest. He was in danger of spoiling his own party.
“Come along.” Sean touched Imogen’s bare arm. “Let me take you away from all this. If you’re hungry, there’s food in the dining room.”
Cass had hired a well-known firm of caterers to supply the food, but Sophie was the one busily piling shepherd’s pie and chili onto plates.
“Everyone else here is old,” she complained, giving Sean a messy extra helping of chili. “I’m bored. And I heard Dad being mean to you just now.” The wide gray eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses turned their attention to Imogen. “Honestly, he can be such a grump. You should have heard the go he had at Mum this afternoon, all about nosy bloody strangers invading his birthday party. To be fair, I have to say he isn’t usually this premenstrual.”
She was a funny-looking little thing, Imogen decided. The out-and-out glamour of the Mandevilles made Sophie’s averageness even more startling by comparison. With her small, pale face, short brown hair, and light eyes magnified by those unflattering glasses, she bore no immediate resemblance to any of them. The fact that she had probably cut her own hair and was so casually dressed in a beige sweatshirt and khaki shorts signified that she didn’t give a hoot. Yet her complexion was flawless, the figure beneath the baggy clothes perfectly proportioned. It would be interesting, Imogen thought, to see how she turned out in three or four years’ time. There was a definite hint of promise. Sophie had the kind of looks that could tweak themselves into place and suddenly click.
“I don’t mind about your dad,” Imogen told her. “Will you be here tomorrow afternoon when the photographer from Hi! comes around?”
Sophie continued to ladle out shepherd’s pie. She cringed. “No fear. Cleo’s the one around here for all that draping herself in front of a camera. Not me.”
“Our little Soph?” Grinning, Sean pinched her white cheek. “Having her photo taken is a bit too frivolous, a bit too much like show business for Sophie’s liking. Unless she’s being arrested at some save-a-tree rally that is.”
* * *
An hour later, Imogen excused herself from the group she had been talking to out on the terrace and made her way upstairs. One of the disadvantages of being a redhead was having to wear instant tan to prevent her skin from glowing fluorescent-white in the dark like those plastic skeletons in cereal boxes. On hot nights such as this, instant tan had a horrible habit of going streaky. It was always advisable to keep an eye on it. Ever prepared to carry out a quick repair job before other people could spot the mess and recoil in horror, Imogen kept a spare tube with her at all times.
A glance at her reflection in the full-length mirror that dominated the glitzy blue-and-gold bathroom told her she was right to do so. Turning this way and that, Imogen used a wad of white toilet paper to mop up the melted bits at the backs of her knees, in the elbow creases, and—most noticeably of all—in her cleavage. She cursed beneath her breath as someone outside the bathroom turned the door handle. Hurrying always made it worse, and there was no way she was going to leave until her white patches were safely covered up.
The door handle rattled again just as she unscrewed the top. Imogen whimpered, aghast, as a gleaming dollop of chestnut-brown tanning cream fountained out of the tube, landing with an almost audible splat on the glorious lapis lazuli bathroom carpet.
First the perfume, now the tanning cream, she thought despairingly. If Jack Mandeville should find out about this, no doubt the next thing to be spilled would be her own blood.
The next two minutes were spent on her knees, frantically scrubbing at the stain on the carpet with yet more handfuls of toilet paper and someone’s yellow washcloth. Imogen’s heart nearly stopped when a thunderous hammering at the bathroom door was followed by the instantly recognizable voice of Jack Mandeville.
“Come on now. Time’s up. If someone’s passed out in there, I’ll have to break the door down.”
“Just coming,” squeaked Imogen, stuffing the shredded, incriminating toilet paper down the toilet and flushing. With shaking hands, she rubbed just enough cream into her cleavage and behind her knees to camouflage the white bits. Now her face was all pink, shining with perspiration and guilt. Behind every effortlessly chic career girl, Imogen thought ruefully, was a fraud, a hopeless mess struggling to get out. At least she hoped there was. She couldn’t bear it if she was the only one around.
“You.” Jack Mandeville gave her one of those despairing, told-you-so looks when she unlocked and finally opened the bathroom door, as if he might have known it would be her.
Oh, but goodness, he was attractive. Imogen hung on to the door handle and held his gaze.
“Look, I’m not sure what I’ve done to deserve this.” She spoke quietly, though there was no one else in sight. “You don’t approve of me, that much is screamingly obvious, but I’m sorry, I still don’t understand why.”
“Maybe I don’t approve of what you do,” Jack retaliated. “I mean, this magazine of yours, this form of so-called journalism.” His tone was cutting. “It’s hardly Pulitzer Prize–winning stuff, is it? Doesn’t it bother you, turning out such endless pap?”
“Yes.” Imogen shook back her bangs and stared at him. “Of course I’d rather be doing something more intellectually stimulating, but this was the job I was offered, and I needed to pay the rent. It isn’t that terrible anyway,” she added with a flicker of anger. “We’re hardly talking hard-core porn here. Our magazine is harmless.”
“Not to mention pointless.”
This was bizarre. Imogen took a deep breath.
“Look, your wife is donating her fee to charity. She’s asked us to send it to Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity. Is it still pointless if that money helps to save a child’s life?”
Since there was really no answer to that, Jack glared at her and used the politician’s tactic of changing the subject.
“I don’t much care for the way you angled an invitation to this party either. My wife might fall for the professional flattery, Miss Trent, but it cuts no ice with me.” He paused for a second, his mouth narrow. “And if you so much as consider selling little snippets of gossip about tonight to any publication, I shall sue.”
There was no doubt he meant it. For a second, in the face of such venom, Imogen felt her throat tighten. She wasn’t that awful. Other people usually liked her as much as she liked them, and she had certainly liked the idea of meeting Jack Mandeville. He was deeply attractive, he had intelligence and charisma, and he was even wearing the most delicious mulberry-and-dark-green-striped shirt she had ever seen in her life. Who wouldn’t be attracted to a man with such a catalogue of assets? And why, when she had undeniable assets of her own, wasn’t he in turn attracted to her?
Then, quite suddenly, it clicked. Imogen felt almost light-headed as realization dawned. Of course! This whole barrage of abuse had come down on her precisely because he did find her attractive!
I’m right, Imogen acknowledged with a surge of triumph. That’s it!
She could see it now, in his dark eyes and in the way he leaned against the bathroom door, apparently casually but in reality not casual at all.
The sense of power it gave her was thrilling.
Well, well, she thought with a smile. Now here was a twist for the books. Even Jack Mandeville, that most famously faithful of husbands, had his moments of weakness.
Imogen tingled all over, reveling in the discovery.
He was, he really was, as attracted to her as she was to him.
And he didn’t like it one bit.
Chapter 5
Comedy Inc., situated halfway along Jelahay Street in Soho, didn’t look terrific from the outside. Squashed between a strip joint and a burger bar, with blue paint peeling from its ancient door and the brass Comedy Inc. nameplate devoid of polish, it boasted an unprepossessing gray stucco exterior, less than twelve feet wide and splattered with graffiti.
But Barney was a notorious tightwad, hence the twenty-year-old swirly red-and-green carpet so sticky with spilled beer it glued your feet to the floor. The stage wasn’t much better either; the boards were probably saturated with the sweat of a thousand nervous comics. At least Sean hoped it was only sweat…
Half his mind began to wander off on this new tangent, considering the possibilities of fitting it into the act even as he carried on chatting to the audience, addressing an imaginary nun at table thirteen about the perils of drinking rum and Coke in half-pint mugs.
This was how Sean worked; his stream-of-consciousness monologues concerned everyday people and issues. Jokes with punch lines weren’t his style. He preferred to strike chords, making people rock with laughter because what he said was so right and leaving them wondering why they couldn’t have thought of it themselves.
His act was never the same two nights running.
A compulsive ad-libber, he was always careering wildly off in new and hitherto unexplored directions as fresh ideas came to him. Mostly, it worked; sometimes, it didn’t. Sean never let that bother him. As long as he was onstage, performing, he was happy. And because laughter was an aphrodisiac, he had more than his share of offers. There were always plenty of girls ready and willing to show him their idea of a good time…like that stupendous blond at table seven, in for the third night running. Neither she nor her incredible shrinking skirts had escaped Sean’s notice. Maybe tonight, he decided, after the show, he would make a move. Introduce himself.
