Two's Company

by Jill Mansell

  “Tom Sharpe makes me laugh out loud on the tube,” said Pandora. “Deeply embarrassing. If you can’t sleep, how about a cup of tea?”

  Sean wasn’t in the mood for tea. A fresh wave of jealousy swept over him as he wondered whether the big, blond guy in the photos was better in bed than he was. Putting down his water glass, he crossed the room and kissed Pandora very slowly on the mouth. When her arms slid around his neck and he felt her warm, scented body begin to respond, he murmured, “I’ve got a much better idea.”

  But Pandora was smothering giggles against his shoulder. She was shaking all over, so helpless with laughter, he practically had to hold her up.

  “What?” Sean demanded, his suspicions instantly aroused. He only liked people to laugh when he’d said something funny. What if she was actually making fun of him?

  Pandora wiped her streaming eyes, hiccupped twice, and tried valiantly to control herself.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. You’re being so macho and seductive.” She gazed apologetically up at him, but her lip was trembling. Laughter threatened to spill out once more. “I just can’t cope with being seduced by a man in a blue terry dressing gown with daisies all over it and a hard-on.”

  Chapter 9

  Ten days after their first meeting at the Cameron Club, Jack spotted Imogen again. For some time, he surreptitiously watched her pant her way through the last stretch of a strenuous aerobics routine. Imogen, on the other side of the glass, pretended she hadn’t spotted him.

  When the class was over, she emerged, pink and glistening in a black T-shirt and leggings, with a russet towel slung around her shoulders. Jack found himself acknowledging her with a brief nod and a smile. The next moment, he heard himself say, “This time, you definitely look as if you could use a drink. What’ll it be?”

  Yes, yes, thought Imogen triumphantly. She had been wondering how long it would take him to make the first vital move. These happily married types, as she knew only too well, could drive you wild with impatience. Sometimes it took them weeks just to pluck up enough courage to think adulterous thoughts…

  And what a wicked waste of time that was.

  Smiling, Imogen mentally congratulated Jack Mandeville. Ten days was neither too keen nor too slow. As far as she was concerned, ten days was just about perfect.

  Jack knew what he was doing but was powerless to stop. The magnetic attraction sparking between Imogen and himself was so intense, he hadn’t the will to resist. It went, too, against all his long and vigorously held principles, but then, nothing like this had ever happened to him before.

  The only way Jack had been able to justify the effect this could have on his marriage was by telling himself that, for the past ten days, he had been far nicer than usual to live with. Whether it was out of sheer guilt or because just thinking about Imogen Trent made him feel better, he didn’t know. It just worked. Cass had even remarked on the fact herself.

  “I hate to say this, but people are beginning to raise their eyebrows in our direction.”

  As she spoke, Imogen drained her glass of orange juice and glanced up at the clock. It was nearly one, and she was ravenous. If she didn’t eat soon, she would pass out.

  Jack read her mind. He also had a deadline to meet on the weekly column he wrote for the Daily Herald. Missing the deadline somehow seemed less important than missing out on another hour with Imogen.

  “There’s a little Italian place on Cardew Street,” he said rapidly. “No one goes there—it’s practically empty at lunchtime. Why don’t I go on ahead and order while you shower and change?”

  That way, they could be seen leaving the club separately. For a novice in the field, Jack felt he wasn’t doing too badly at all.

  Imogen, who knew better, didn’t have the heart to tell him the double bluff was far and away the more effective ploy. Lunch at a crowded restaurant where you were bound to bump into heaps of people you knew was so much more sensible than running the risk of being caught hiding out in an empty one.

  Still, she was touched by this demonstration of Jack’s lack of experience in such matters. She was further amused, upon reaching La Traviata forty minutes later, to see that he had chosen to ignore the half a dozen or so free parking spaces directly outside the restaurant. Instead, his car was on a meter around the corner next to a tatty-looking bookshop.

  Jack was pretending to study the menu when she pushed the door open. Imogen’s heart contracted with lust at the sight of him. He was forty and so ridiculously good-looking, it almost took her breath away. In that pale-pink polo shirt and those faded jeans, with his tanned, finely muscled arms resting on the table before him, the idea that he could be the father of grown-up children seemed ludicrous.

  By mutual agreement, they stuck to mineral water. Imogen ordered tagliatelle with artichokes; Jack chose spaghetti carbonara and found he couldn’t eat it. His appetite had gone, possibly forever. He watched and drank the iced Pellegrino as Imogen, now changed into a purple shirt and short white skirt, did enough eating for the two of them.

  “Sorry,” Imogen said at last, not sorry at all. “I always eat when I’m nervous.”

  “I never can.” Jack, his dark eyes intent, touched her hand. They were the only customers in the pretty blue-and-white dining room. There was no longer any point maintaining the pretense. “And there’s no need to be nervous anyway. One should only be nervous about things one doesn’t want to happen.”

  Imogen, hopelessly excited, tried to look demure. “What about the things that shouldn’t happen?”

  As far as Jack was concerned, it was already too late. Fate had taken over. He shrugged.

  “Sometimes they just do.”

  This was seriously erotic stuff. Imogen wondered if this was how people felt when they matched six numbers in the lottery. It was the silliest situation too, she realized: here they both were, acknowledging that they were on the brink of an affair, and nothing physical had even happened yet. They hadn’t even kissed.

  “I want to kiss you.” Goodness, she was getting quite emotional. Her voice caught in her throat. Nodding to show how much she meant it, Imogen tried again. “I do.”

  “So do I.” A smile flickered across Jack’s face. His eyes darted in the direction of the chef and the waiter hunched over espressos and glasses of Strega at the far end of the restaurant. But his was a television face, and there were some risks only a madman would take. He couldn’t afford to kiss Imogen here.

  She knew he was right, but that didn’t stop it being frustrating. Had courting couples in the old days really endured years of desperate waiting until they were decently married? Too much anticipation, Imogen thought, surely couldn’t be good for you. She barely knew how she was going to survive the afternoon.

  “It’s two thirty.” Jack looked at his watch and tried to care about his fast-approaching deadline. All he really wanted Imogen to do was suggest going back to her place.

  More disappointment was in store.

  “We haven’t organized ourselves very well, have we?” She gave him a rueful smile. “I’m interviewing some Arab princess in Belgravia at three. If I’d known this was going to happen today, I could have unfixed it. Oh, Jack…” She clutched his hand and concentrated on not looking too gleeful. “I still can’t believe this is happening. I keep thinking about Cass.”

  Showing a bit of concern for the wronged wife was always a good move. Nobody liked an out-and-out bitch.

  “And you think I haven’t? What Cass doesn’t know can’t hurt her.” Jack shook his head. Unoriginal maybe, but it was what he kept telling himself. “She mustn’t find out, that’s all.”

  Plenty of men led full and happy lives, successfully maintaining both marriage and mistress. Jack knew of several who did just that, men whose wives remained blissfully unaware of the situation for years on end. Why shouldn’t that happen to him?

  Some men, on the
other hand, got found out in no time at all.

  It was as much as Jack could do, as they left the restaurant, not to slide his fingers beneath the red-gold tumble of Imogen’s hair and caress the vulnerable nape of her neck. The urge to touch her was almost irresistible. So deep in thought was he, trying to work out when they could see each other again, that he didn’t even register the gaggle of schoolgirls spilling out of the bookshop onto the dusty sidewalk ahead.

  Those spindly little legs were oddly familiar, Imogen realized. With her journalist’s eye, she noticed such details. Now who was it she knew with spindly legs and a funny DIY haircut?

  Chapter 10

  “Um…isn’t that your daughter?”

  Jack barely had time to groan before Sophie, with almost telepathic timing, spun around.

  “Dad!”

  “Sophie…”

  Heavens. Imogen reminded herself that this wasn’t funny. Oh, but please, how could such a smart man look so amazingly guilty?

  Sophie, meanwhile, was struggling to recall where she had seen the woman at her father’s side before.

  “Imogen Trent, Hi! magazine,” Imogen prompted. “Remember me? The one not wearing stockings and garters?”

  “Of course.” Sophie’s face cleared. “The one Dad was incredibly rude to at his party.”

  “Not incredibly rude.” Jack was still looking shell-shocked.

  “Yes, you were.” Imogen turned back to Sophie. “He was a pig, wasn’t he? I can still hardly believe he’s speaking to me now.”

  “Don’t tell me he’s agreed to do an interview.” This time, Sophie’s tone was one of frank disbelief. “Not for Hi! ”

  “He might be a pig,” said Imogen cheerfully, “but he hasn’t sprouted wings. Nothing that dramatic, I’m afraid. We just bumped into each other at the Cameron Club. He apologized for being awful the other week, I nearly passed out with the shock, and we decided to seal the truce with a quick spaghetti at La Traviata.”

  Beside her, Jack stiffened. It clearly hadn’t occurred to him that they must both reek of garlic. He’s such a novice, Imogen thought fondly.

  But Sophie was in too much of a hurry to catch up with the rest of her friends to be that interested. Shifting her bookshop bargain—Teach Yourself Swahili—from one hand to the other, she merely gave her father an approving nod.

  “Good. Mum’ll be pleased anyway.”

  Mum wouldn’t if she knew what was really going on, thought Imogen.

  She tried to feel ashamed of herself. And failed.

  * * *

  Cass was sunbathing out on the terrace when Jack arrived home. As he had watched Imogen from a distance earlier, so he now stood in the cool sanctuary of the living room, studying his wife and wondering just what it was that created sexual attraction.

  He also wondered why, after so many years of almost indecently happy marriage, the attraction to Imogen should have struck him like this out of the blue. It wasn’t something he’d gone looking for, nor something he had particularly wanted to happen, except that now, since it had happened, he wanted it furiously, more than anything else in the world.

  It wasn’t even as if he had one of those wives who had let herself go. With some men—some women too, of course—you saw the appalling state of their respective spouses and felt they positively deserved a bit on the side to cheer themselves up.

  But Cass had never let herself go. Who, in all fairness, could ask for more? At thirty-nine, she possessed the kind of body many twenty-year-olds would envy. No stretch marks, no cellulite. Her stomach didn’t sag, and she waxed her legs regularly and always smelled gorgeous. She had an innate sense of style too; whatever she wore looked good. Now, with her blond hair glinting in the sunlight as it spilled over the back of the dark-blue sun lounger and with her golden breasts spilling out of a green bikini, she looked utterly delectable.

  On a scale of one to ten, Cass rated a nine, because the heavenly Claudia Schiffer had been Jack’s one and only ten. But even as he now found himself in the grip of this new and overwhelming infatuation, he had to admit Imogen Trent was no nine. The red hair was gorgeous, the fake tan less so. She was undoubtedly good-looking and her figure was fine, but stand her next to Cass and ask an impartial audience who was the more attractive and—no question about it—Cass would win.

  Jack hated himself for even thinking anything so crass. He remembered the words of that famously faithful actor, Paul Newman: Why go out for a hamburger when you have steak at home? The trouble was, after twenty-three years of nonstop steak, wouldn’t anyone find themselves yearning to try a burger, just for a change?

  Ugh, that was crass too. He watched Cass wriggle into a sitting position, adjust her sunglasses, and pick up a buff folder of the notes and letters she needed to go through for tomorrow morning’s program. Reminded—as if he needed reminding—of his own fast-approaching deadline, Jack stepped out of the shadowy sitting room onto the sun-drenched terrace.

  “Darling.” Cass lifted her face for a kiss. “I thought I heard the car just now. It’s so hot out here. You couldn’t do my back and shoulders?”

  Glad of the excuse to stand behind her, Jack began slowly massaging Ambre Solaire into her smooth, sun-warmed skin.

  “You’ll never guess who I took out to lunch today.”

  “Tom Cruise, Paddington Bear, Madonna, Barack Obama…?”

  “Your friend Imogen Trent.”

  Cass’s mouth dropped open in astonishment. Expecting him to say “Joke,” she swiveled half around on the lounger.

  “Really?”

  “Really.” Jack carried on massaging the oil into her shoulders with slow, deliberate strokes.

  “My God, I think I’m going to faint.”

  “That’s what Imogen said. She sends her love, by the way.”

  “But how—”

  “She’s just joined the Cameron Club. We bumped into each other at the bar, and I remembered how angry you were with me after the party, so I thought I’d better apologize. That’s when she nearly passed out with the shock,” Jack continued drily. “Anyway, we chatted for a bit. When she mentioned how hungry she was, I did the decent thing and took her out for some pasta. So that’s it, we’ve made up.” Screwing the top back onto the Ambre Solaire bottle, he wiped his hands on a nearby towel. “She’s not so bad, I suppose. We got along fairly well. Oh, and Imogen says if you ever fancy a spot of torture, she’d love the company. She does the advanced aerobics class, run by Susie the Sadist. I said there was no way in the world you’d go to that.”

  “I might.” Cass, amazed and delighted by the news of Jack and Imogen’s reconciliation, took off her dark glasses to make sure it really was true.

  “But you hate aerobics.” It was Jack’s turn to be taken aback.

  “I know, but these things are always more fun if you’re with a friend. I wouldn’t mind if I knew Imogen was going to be there. Besides”—Cass prodded her brown midriff—“I should start doing something before it’s too late. All the girls in the office go to keep-fit classes, and Cleo keeps nagging me too. I am pushing forty after all.” She frowned. “Although I’m not sure I could handle an advanced class. Is Imogen amazingly fit? I wouldn’t want to show myself up.”

  “You wouldn’t show yourself up.” Jack’s tone was curt. His guilty imagination, working overtime, had conjured up once more the mental image of Cass and Imogen standing next to each other, being judged by an audience of club regulars through the glass partition that separated the aerobics studio from the bar.

  “Really?” Cass looked pleased. “In that case, I might give it a go.”

  Chapter 11

  Setting up and checking out Colin Matheson had proved ridiculously easy. All Cleo had needed to do was enlist the help of a friend, Miranda, who had wandered into the bar where Colin was drinking and had promptly found herself being chatted up.

 
; He hadn’t so much taken the bait as swallowed it whole. And he had clearly had plenty of practice, Miranda had reported back. Meeting other girls and being unfaithful to Linda was all in a day’s work for him. He probably regarded it as no more than a harmless pastime, like cricket. Miranda had taken enormous pleasure in turning his offer down.

  Delighted with the success of her plan, Cleo nevertheless felt her courage begin to slip away at the prospect of having to actually break the news to poor Linda. Colin might be pond scum and a creep of the first order, but Linda’s life had revolved around him for the last three and a half years.

  In the event, when they met up again in a little wine bar just off Berkeley Square, Linda did the dirty work for her.

  “He went for it, didn’t he?” She took a deep, despairing drag of her cigarette. Her huge, violet eyes drooped at the corners. “It’s OK, you can say it. I’m not going to slit my wrists.”

  Cleo had to remind herself she was doing Linda the favor of her life.

  “I’m so sorry.” The words came tumbling out. “You said he always stopped off for a couple of drinks at Vampires when he finished work. I sent Miranda along, because you said he liked brunettes; all she had to do was stand next to him at the bar and drop her purse. Colin helped her pick up the money, started chatting, introduced himself…and that was it. Two drinks later, he was inviting her to dinner at San Lorenzo. When Miranda asked if he was involved with anyone, he told her he’d just broken up with a girlfriend and was enjoying being single again.” Cleo shook her head in disgust. “God, why are men such devious shits?”

  The famous violet eyes now filled with shimmering tears. “I’ll have to cancel the wedding. Oh, this is horrid. What if I never meet anyone nice again? I’ll end up a dried-up, miserable old spinster. Nobody will want me.”

  “Look, if he chatted up Miranda in three seconds flat, it means he’s done it before and he’ll do it again, forever and ever amen. But it’s up to you,” said Cleo more gently. “If you really want to marry him, go ahead.”