by Jill Mansell
He couldn’t help but be wary. Of course it was flattering, but was it realistic? Wasn’t he in danger of falling into exactly the same trap as Pandora? It was all very well, thought Joel, for Cleo to talk ecstatically about true love, but how did he know she wasn’t just amusing herself with a five-minute fling?
“Oh, stop it.” Glimpsing the expression on his face, Cleo guessed at once what was going through his mind. Again.
“Stop what?”
“Don’t be such an old pessimist.” She gave his knee an affectionate squeeze. “How many times do I have to say it before you start believing me? There’s no reason why we can’t be together. All we have to do now is relax and enjoy it.”
“How can I?” Joel looked exasperated. “You’re Cleo Mandeville. I’m Joel Grant. I’m not rich, I’m not famous, and I sell secondhand cars for a living. I mean, what are people going to think?”
“That you must be a fantastically nice person,” Cleo declared with passion. “Not to mention extraordinary in bed…”
The words slipped out before she could help it. As soon as Cleo heard herself utter them, she felt her cheeks redden. Now what on earth could have possessed her to come out with a statement like that?
This, of course, was the trouble with getting to know someone in the romantic sense. When you were waiting for…it…to happen, but it hadn’t happened yet—that delicate stage—there were certain jokey remarks better left unsaid.
Cleo couldn’t wait for it to happen. Normally, she wouldn’t have thought twice about instigating proceedings herself. But this time, it was different. The situation was a tricky one. Under the circumstances, she felt, the seducing should be done by Joel.
“Of course I’m a nice person,” Joel said drily. It seemed safest to pretend her last statement hadn’t been uttered. “You know that and I know that. I just don’t want the rest of the world thinking I’m your bit of rough.”
“Liar.” Cleo grinned. “You’re scared because you think I’m a flighty piece. You think my only real ambition in life is to get laid by Ryan Reynolds. How many times do I have to tell you I’m not like that?”
“Hmm. You mean not like Sean.”
She smirked. “He doesn’t want to get laid by Ryan Reynolds either.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Oh come on. Wasn’t I the one who saved Harriet from the dreaded Damien Maxwell-Horne?” demanded Cleo. She didn’t make a habit of telling people about the Checkamate system, but Joel’s refusal to take her seriously was becoming irritating. “He wasn’t the first either. I don’t just talk about fidelity. Believe me, I do something about it.”
“Are you serious?” asked Joel twenty minutes later when she had finished telling him everything. “You really check these people out? For money?”
“Of course not for money. What do I need with more money?” Cleo looked offended. “I just did it to try and help a few friends. Maxwell-Horne was the only one I dealt with in person,” she added hastily. “Other friends helped out with the rest, because it was for a good cause.”
“But you’ve stopped doing it now?”
Cleo nodded. “Too depressing.”
“You mean everyone failed the test?”
“Not everyone. But most of them.” She couldn’t bring herself to mention Imogen.
“I wouldn’t fail the test,” said Joel quietly. He looked down at her for a long, heart-stopping moment. “If it was tried on me.”
Enough, Cleo decided, was enough. She was dying for Joel to make love to her. It was all very well being noble and telling herself she had to wait and let him make the all-important first move, but how patient could he seriously expect her to be? Much longer and they’d be queueing up together for their damn pensions.
“You mean you’re incorruptible?” Cleo glanced teasingly up at him. “You can resist anything?”
“Anyone,” Joel replied. “Anything.”
“Hmm.”
“What are you doing?”
“Now there’s a silly question.”
Cleo had risen slowly to her feet. Standing before him, in one movement, she pulled the black cashmere sweater off over her head. Next, her fingers moved to the zipper of her muddy jeans, unfastening it without taking her eyes from Joel’s face. He watched the famous body reveal itself, seventy inches of flawlessly sculpted flesh, naked apart from a tiny gray lace bra and matching thong. Cleo’s skin gleamed in the firelight, her coral toenails the only spots of color against the not-quite-all-over tan. There was no getting away from it; she was truly irresistible…
“Put your clothes back on,” said Joel in a low voice. “I’m sorry. I don’t want you to be offended, but I think you should put them on again now.”
He hadn’t moved so much as a muscle. Cleo, smiling slightly, advanced toward him. With her hands on his shoulders, she lowered herself onto Joel’s lap.
“Stop it,” said Joel.
Cleo kissed him, her warm lips parting as they covered his. Her tongue gently explored the inside of his mouth. Her fingers slid upward, burying themselves in the blond hair at the back of his head; her hips began to move slowly against him.
“I mean it,” said Joel when he was able to speak again. His tone was firm. He still hadn’t moved. “Come on now. Be a good girl. Pick those clothes up, and put them back on.” His voice softened. “I really am sorry, sweetheart, but it’s for the best. Look, why don’t I put the kettle on and make us both a nice cup of tea?”
* * *
He caught up with Cleo by the front door. Tears streamed down her face as she writhed like an eel to escape.
“Let fucking go of me…you bastard…get off !”
“Don’t be silly. Of course I’m not going to let go. Ouch.” Joel sucked in his breath as Cleo’s toe-capped cowboy boot made vicious contact with his shin. Grimly, he hung on. “Calm down. Stop crying. You can’t leave anyway, not with your sweater on inside out.”
Cleo didn’t care. All she wanted to do was die. Humiliated beyond belief by Joel’s brutal rejection—no, not brutal; it had been a kindly rejection, which was a hundred times worse—she couldn’t bear to stay in the house a moment longer. She couldn’t bear to look at Joel. She couldn’t stop crying either.
But escape was impossible. Joel was bigger and much stronger than she was. Lashing out with the other boot, Cleo missed completely and almost toppled over. She covered her wet face with both hands, slumped back against the wall, and let out a howl of despair.
“Dear me,” said Joel with a sorrowful shake of his head. “What a state to get into. And there I was thinking you’d be impressed.”
Cleo, red-eyed, glared at him. “Impressed by what, your impotence?”
“Impotence?” Joel looked amused. “You still don’t get it, do you? I’m not impotent.”
“Huh.” Cleo spat the word out in disgust. Damn right she hadn’t gotten it. “Gay, then.”
“Oh come on. You dared me to resist you. No need to have a fit,” Joel protested good-naturedly, “just because I won.”
She shot him a suspicious look. “Is this a joke?”
“Well, it was supposed to be.” He grinned. “Not one of my better ones evidently.”
Cleo still didn’t believe him. She had thought it might be a joke at first, but Joel had so adamantly refused to give in, he must have meant it.
There had been something else too. Or rather there hadn’t.
“I was sitting on top of you,” Cleo whispered, ashamed even to have to say it. “And nothing…happened.”
“Mind over matter.” Joel shrugged but looked pleased with himself. “It’s not easy, let me tell you. The thing is, you have to concentrate like crazy on dustbins full of maggots…shipping forecasts…hair caught in shower drains…”
“I’ve never been so humiliated in my life,” said Cleo.
�
��Well, I’m sorry, but I had something to prove.” Joel stopped smiling. “Like I said, if I had a steady girlfriend, I’d be faithful to her. And nobody in the world—nobody—could make me be unfaithful. Not even someone as beautiful as you.”
Cleo was on the verge of bursting into tears all over again. “OK, OK, but you weren’t supposed to make me feel stupid. You could have kept it going for the first minute, then given in.”
“That,” Joel reminded her, “would have defeated the object.”
Cleo’s knees were trembling. Her eyes swam as she gazed up at him.
“So what happens now?”
“Now?” Joel’s mouth twitched. What did she think he was, completely superhuman? “Now I think I’d better carry you upstairs and start proving a few things to you.”
As he lifted her into his arms, a single tear slid down Cleo’s cheek. She banished the rest with a noisy sniff.
“What things?”
“That I’m not impotent. That I’m not gay.” Joel kissed the solitary tear away. “And that I am extraordinary in bed.”
Chapter 36
It had been a good show.
“Come on,” Jenny said to Cass when it was over. “That one deserves celebrating. I’ll treat you to lunch.”
They went to Edwina’s, a smartly done up restaurant less than half a mile from the Kingdom studios.
“I haven’t been here before,” said Cass, gazing around.
“They only opened two months ago. Luke told me about it. He said they do amazing pumpkin ravioli.”
Cass said nothing. Jenny tried so hard not to look smug and so hard not to mention Luke in every sentence—failing abysmally every time—you couldn’t help but smile.
Jenny tried to look shamefaced instead. “I know, I’ve just done it again. Sorry.”
“Stop apologizing!”
“That’s what Luke—” Jenny clapped her hand over her mouth.
“Look,” Cass protested. “I like it that you’ve met someone wonderful.”
“Now there’s a coincidence. I don’t like it that you haven’t.”
“Please, don’t start. Not another lecture.”
“I want you to be happy,” Jenny protested. She meant it. If anyone deserved happiness, it was Cass.
“I don’t need to be. Cleo’s happy enough for both of us just now.” Cass pulled a long-suffering face. “She’s even more besotted than you are. It’s quite sweet really, seeing her like this after all these years of being tough and cynical. I was beginning to wonder if she’d ever fall in love.”
The waiter arrived to take their orders. Jenny chose the pumpkin ravioli followed by lemon chicken because Luke had said that was terrific too.
“I’ll have the same.” Cass kept a straight face. “What’s good enough for Luke is good enough for me. Ouch, that was my ankle…”
“So Cleo’s keeping it in the family,” Jenny mused when the waiter had left them with a bottle of Barolo, “with Pandora’s big brother.” She nudged Cass’s arm. “Go on then. What’s he like?”
“Big. Nice.” Cass had so far only met him twice, and those meetings had been brief, but from what she was able to tell of Joel, he was just about perfect for Cleo. “He’s keeping her in order. You know how impetuous Cleo is. She’s already jabbering on about wedding dresses and where to hold the reception. But Joel’s taking it all with a bucket of salt. The press are dying to get their claws into him, but he’s not having any of it.”
“Good for him!” Jenny leaned forward and dropped her voice. “Speaking of the press getting their claws in, how’s it going with Jack and the floozy?”
“Oh, couldn’t be more wonderful. Love’s young dream, according to Jack.”
“Middle-aged dream, more like,” Jenny retorted.
Cass realized she was stirring the wine in her glass with her index finger. It was a long-standing habit that had always driven Jack to distraction. Now she was free to do it as much as she liked. For a moment, she was unable to speak.
“He’s deluding himself,” Jenny went on, her tone forceful. “Silly sod. Take it from me. Even if he thinks he’s happy now, it’ll never last.”
“Not that it’s going to affect me either way.” Cass shrugged and tried to look unconcerned. “The divorce papers are almost ready. Not long now.”
Jenny’s dark eyes widened. “God, I had no idea. You didn’t say.”
Drily, Cass said, “I was trying not to think about it. The divorce should be final on the first of July. Our wedding anniversary.”
“Oh, Cass—”
“One thing I want you to promise.”
Jenny nodded. “Anything. What?”
“Just don’t get me one of those jolly, jokey, congratulations-on-your-divorce cards,” said Cass. “I couldn’t bear it.”
The timely arrival of the translucent pumpkin ravioli diverted Jenny’s attention for all of ten minutes. Then she was off again.
“You need to meet someone.”
“And you sound like Sophie.”
“Maybe we’re both right.” As the waiter refilled their glasses, Jenny dabbed melted butter from the corner of her generously lipsticked mouth with a napkin. “I mean it, Cass. Honestly, you’d feel so much better! It gives you such a boost, knowing someone really cares about you—”
“Like Terry Brannigan, you mean?” Cass winced. “He really cared about me…and what a tremendous boost to the ego that was.”
“That was his fault, not yours.” Only Cass, Jenny thought, could feel guilty about having inflicted such a well-deserved bash on the head with a cookie tin.
“I still haven’t heard from him.” Cass, who worried endlessly about what might have happened to Terry, still felt her heart skip a beat each time she read in the paper that another unidentified male had thrown himself beneath the wheels of a speeding subway train.
“I’m not going to give up,” Jenny warned. “I’ll ask Luke if he has any eligible friends.”
“Help. You’re making me nervous.” Cass shook her head in despair. “I’m too old for all that.”
“In that case, I’ll change the subject…for now.” Jenny gave her a sweet smile. “Come on then, old lady. Show me those photos you were babbling on about earlier. The ones of your heavenly grandchild.”
* * *
Terry Brannigan wiped his wet hands on an already damp apron and watched through the crack in the red-painted swing door as Cass and the plump, dark-haired girl made their way out of the restaurant. Cass, wearing a black-and-white jacket, a flatteringly cut above-the-knee black skirt, and high heels, looked wonderful. James, the sous-chef, came to peer through the small circular window in the door.
“What’s this, celebrity spotting or just ogling a great pair of legs? That’s Cass Mandeville.”
Terry turned away, his face expressionless.
“I know.”
* * *
“I’m going to miss you so much,” Cleo murmured. She cradled Joel’s face between her hands and covered it with kisses. “I don’t want to go to boring, wet, old Venice.”
Joel smiled down at her.
“So don’t go.”
“I have to.” Cleo smoothed his blond hair away from his forehead, glad he didn’t use gel like every male model she had ever known. “They’re paying me squillions.” She brightened. “But afterward, I’ll have a whole week free. We could get away somewhere. Have you ever been to Acapulco?”
It didn’t occur to her that he had a car showroom to run. At moments like this, Joel realized the immensity of the difference between them.
“I’m working. I can’t just take a week off.”
Cleo, opening her mouth to ask why not, closed it again in the nick of time.
“I’m sorry. I’m going to miss you, that’s all.” She tried to look penitent, failed miserably, and kissed h
is adorable broken nose instead. “You’ll have to phone me hundreds of times to make up for it.”
Joel could only too easily imagine the scenario; it would take a hundred calls before he managed to get hold of her.
“You’ll be in Venice,” he pointed out. “What are you going to do, lock yourself in your hotel room each night and read the Gideon Bible?”
“I might go out.” Cleo looked offended. “But it isn’t as if I’ll be on the prowl.”
“It still might be easier if you phone me.”
“We’ll phone each other.” She threw her arms around him. “Morning, noon, and night. After all, I have to make sure you stay on the straight and narrow too.”
It was easy for Cleo to say. Joel only wished he could believe her. Just the other night, while they were driving through the West End, he had pointed to a huge billboard advertising the latest designer aftershave. The male model, brooding down at them from a height of thirty feet, was one of the most successful in the country. He was also rumored to be amazingly well endowed, which tied in nicely with the aftershave’s advertising slogan: Could you say no to this?
“Well,” Joel had said jokingly, “could you?”
And Cleo, without batting an eyelid, had replied in casual fashion, “What, say no to Murphy Mackay? He’s a prat. And he’s doing the Venice shoot next week. Yuck. Who says I don’t suffer for my art?”
As if, thought Joel, anyone could suffer in Venice. But that had been beside the point; prat or no prat, Murphy Mackay was pretty daunting competition. Particularly if those rumors about the size of his tackle were true.
“If you want me to call you,” Joel told Cleo now, “you’d better tell me where you’re staying.”
She scrabbled around in her bag, found the printed-off details, and flipped through it.
“Um…here we are. The Hotel San Carlo. God, these people are stingy. Why couldn’t it be somewhere decent for once like the Cipriani?”
Joel said, “The San Carlo? Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure. Why?” Cleo was instantly suspicious. “Don’t tell me. You’ve been there, and it’s a complete fleapit on the verge of disappearing into the lagoon.”
