by Anne Oliver
Right on cue, there was a knock on the door and it opened slowly to reveal the woman he’d not stopped thinking about since she’d walked out of his hotel room a few hours earlier.
Tallulah’s face was pale in contrast to the dark circles around her eyes and her hair was pulled back into a severe twist, perversely making her seem younger and more vulnerable than the woman he remembered.
He couldn’t let that cloud his decision, though. In fact, she’d probably deliberately chosen that look to appeal to his soft side.
He shifted in his chair as his stomach plunged and twisted at the memory of her soft side pressed against him.
‘Hello, Tallulah. Come in.’ He gestured towards the seat next to him, keeping his movements firm and steady.
She was staring at him, her eyes wide and her mouth hanging open as though her greeting had caught in her throat.
Was she really going to pretend to be surprised to see him here? Did she have the gall?
‘Tristan?’ Her voice came out in a breathy whisper and she dipped her chin and cleared her throat, glancing over her shoulder before stepping into the room and closing the door. Turning back, she held out her hands as if she couldn’t believe it was him sitting there. ‘What—?’ She shook her head, conjuring up a stunned smile. ‘What are you doing here?’
Apparently she did have the gall.
‘You’re really going to pretend you didn’t know who I was last night?’
She frowned, her cute button nose wrinkling in apparent confusion. ‘I didn’t—’
‘You lied to me. You said your name was Louise.’
Colour flooded her cheeks and she parted her lips and let out a sharp huff of breath, doing a great job of looking abashed.
He crossed his arms. ‘So what is it? Louise or Tallulah?’
She shifted in those ludicrous heels of hers and cleared her throat again. ‘It’s Tallulah.’ Catching his eye, she gave him a cautious smile. ‘I know, with an awesome name like Tallulah Lazenby you’d think I’d be taller,’ she joked, clearly hoping to draw a smile from him.
When he didn’t respond she walked over to where he was sitting, stumbling a little in her heels, and perched on the chair next to him, splaying her hands, which appeared to be trembling, on the table. ‘My friends call me Lu or Lula, but it’s short for Tallulah—which I only use for my professional persona.’
She stared down at the table. ‘I didn’t mean to lie to you; I just thought it would be fun to pretend to be someone else for the evening, so I didn’t correct you when you called me Louise.’
Her gaze flicked up to meet his. Her eyes were wide and she was doing a damn good impression of looking mortified at being caught out. ‘Believe me, I had no idea it was you I was meeting with today. Jez didn’t tell me your father couldn’t make it.’
That sensuous voice of hers was evoking the deep sexual ache he’d been battling to ignore since she walked in, only increasing his edginess.
Was she telling the truth? He was disturbed by his inability to tell. It wasn’t like him to feel this ruffled and he sure as hell didn’t like it.
Sighing, he leant back in his chair, away from her stupefying presence. ‘To be honest, I don’t know what to believe, Tallulah.’
She looked at him as though he was crazy. ‘You think I deliberately lied to you?’ Her disdain made the hairs on the back of his neck rise and his blood pump faster.
Marcy had acted in exactly the same way towards him once when he’d accused her of cheating on him—months before she finally admitted she had actually done the dirty and was leaving. His gut feeling had been bang on that time.
Perhaps Tallulah realised she’d been rumbled and was trying to brazen it out by appearing outraged by his suggestion in order to force him to back down.
Not going to happen.
‘It’s quite a coincidence that we met last night, though. And that you were so keen to sleep with me.’
Her face flushed bright red, but she still managed to give him an are-you-for-real? look. ‘I seem to remember you being just as keen on the idea.’
He stared back, maintaining cool eye contact. Her gaze slid away from his and he felt validated by her retreat.
Gotcha.
‘Anyway,’ she muttered, ‘you know what they say: life is stranger than fiction.’ Her gaze moved to the bacon sandwich on the table next to her and he caught the flash of longing on her face, before she carefully blanked her expression.
‘You hungry?’ he asked, motioning towards his food. He wondered whether she’d have the balls to try and take his food as well as his pride.
She frowned and glanced up at him, her gaze raking his face for signs of a trap. ‘Why? Are you offering me your breakfast?’ she asked, clearly suspecting he’d set a booby trap and she’d be ejected straight out of the building if she made so much as a move towards it.
He felt the corner of his mouth twitch into an involuntary smile and had to fight to pull back his stern expression. He shrugged. ‘If you want it. Judging by the size of those glasses of wine you downed and the way you exerted yourself last night, I’m guessing you probably need it right about now.’
She leaned forwards in her chair, her eyebrows pinched together and her gaze steady. ‘I don’t normally do things like that, you know. It was only because it was Laura’s birthday and I promised to go and I hate letting people down when I’ve promised something.’
‘Even though you had this meeting today?’
She sighed and sat back, turning to stare out of the window. ‘I know, it was unprofessional, but I was nervous about today and then I met you and couldn’t drag myself away.’ Her gaze flitted back to his and Tristan could have sworn her pupils dilated.
She reached out a hand towards him, but he drew away quickly. The last thing he needed was for her to touch him when his whole body ached to pull her out of that chair and into his lap. She was clearly trying to use the connection she’d forged with him last night to get herself out of trouble and he needed to be careful.
He crossed his arms against his chest in a show of defensiveness and nodded again to the food in front of her.
‘If you want it, it’s yours, Tallulah. Go ahead. Help yourself.’
‘You like your power games, don’t you?’ she said, catching on to his pointed sarcasm and narrowing her eyes.
‘Power games?’ He paused and thought about it. It was a test, of sorts. Would she sit there and tuck in, showing a devil-may-care attitude? Or would she refuse to touch it on principle?
The ball was in her court.
‘It’s just a sandwich, Tallulah,’ he said, raising a derisive eyebrow and waiting for her move.
Their gazes locked and he found himself inappropriately turned on by engaging in this battle of wills with her. He was acutely aware of how intensely focused she was on him, as if she was trying to read his innermost thoughts. It was as if nothing but him existed in the world at that moment and it reminded him of how it had drawn him in the night before.
She played well, but she sure as hell was not going to win this.
* * *
Lula’s heart beat so hard against her chest she thought it might escape at any second and run wildly around the room shouting, She can’t take the pressure; her head’s about to explode! She needed to keep calm and maintain some sort of composure here, but being this close to Tristan again was addling her already exhausted brain.
And she wanted to eat that bacon sandwich, so much, but she was afraid she’d look weak and lose the game and he’d hand her a P45 and wave her on her way without a second thought. On the other hand, perhaps she needed to woman up here and show him she wasn’t intimidated by his game-playing. To convince him she wasn’t a liar or a manipulator like Jez.
Her reputation was on the line.
Resting her elbows on the arms of the chair and clasping her hands together in front of her, she considered her next move. The sensible thing to do was to brush aside her little white lie last night and bring the conversation back to her issue with Jez.
‘Look, can we put aside what happened yesterday for now and focus on the reason for this meeting?’ she said with as much composure as she could muster.
Tristan sat back in his chair and stared at her for a moment, one assessing eyebrow raised, before gesturing for her to continue.
She nodded her thanks and took a deep breath to try and even out her erratic breathing, fixing him with what she hoped was an emphatic-looking gaze.
Don’t let me down now, brain.
‘Jez has been subjecting me to sexual harassment for months. Recently he withdrew his promise to give me the Breakfast Show—which he currently hosts and should have moved me onto ages ago—because I wouldn’t sleep with him.’
There was no need to mention the little ‘slip-up’ of already having slept with him—just because she’d given in once, it didn’t mean she was obliged to again. She had a horrible feeling it might weaken her position if Tristan knew she’d already succumbed to Jez’s advances, but most of all she was embarrassed to admit how weak-minded she’d been. She didn’t want Tristan to think she was just some easy lay. It would taint the memory of the incredible night they’d had together.
She leant forwards in her seat. ‘I deserve to be given that show on my own merit. I’m damn good at what I do, but when I made it perfectly clear I wasn’t going to be blackmailed into sleeping with him he took me off my Drivetime Show too.’ Her voice cracked at the end of the sentence and she cleared her throat and looked away from him, blinking away the hard pressure behind her eyes. This was no time for tears, but the mixture of stress, lack of sleep and confusion about how she felt about seeing Tristan again were playing havoc with her state of mind.
She longed for him to smile at her like he had last night. Just the quirk of a lip would do—anything, to break the icy atmosphere that had formed between them. But Tristan only nodded, his face devoid of expression.
‘How long have you wanted the Breakfast Show?’ he asked, his gaze averted as he picked up the tablet next to him and tapped something into it.
His sudden lack of attention made her go cold. She was losing him. ‘Since I started working here. Hell, since I first started working on the radio. It’s the best gig at the station. At any station.’ Her voice sounded panicky and she took another calming breath before continuing. ‘Jez promised me he’d stand aside and let me take over six months after I joined Flash, but he’s hung on and hung on. He loves the status it gives him, but he can’t run a show for toffee. He makes the station look amateurish.’ Her voice had become louder and harsher the more she talked and she ended in a rush, her brow furrowed in a painfully tense scowl.
Damn her runaway mouth.
The way Tristan was silently studying her now was unnerving. There was no longer any sign of the playful, trusting man she’d been so intimate with only hours ago.
A tic jumped in her eye and her temple throbbed in time to its beat as she waited nervously for his response.
‘I can see that you’re very ambitious, Tallulah.’
The way he said it made it sound so seedy. The slow sinking feeling in her stomach told her he’d already made his decision and it wasn’t to her benefit.
‘The trouble is, Jeremy seems to be doing a good job here and he’s made it perfectly clear he’s not prepared to work with you any longer. He thinks you’re disruptive and apparently you regularly turn up for your shift late. He suspects you’ve been drunk on at least one occasion whilst performing on-air.’
‘What?’ Her utter disgust that Jez would lie like that couldn’t have been more clear, but Tristan seemed unmoved.
‘I’m never late and I’m practically teetotal!’ She flushed as she remembered the enormous glasses of wine he’d seen her drink the night before.
Of course he didn’t believe her side of it; he’d met Louise last night.
Damn it. If she hadn’t played that stupid pretend-to-be-someone-else game she wouldn’t be in this mess right now.
‘I know it looks bad right now, Tristan, but Jez is the liar here, not me.’
‘Really, Louise.’
Her face flushed hot as he stared at her, his eyebrows raised in rebuke.
She looked away, trying to get her thoughts straight.
‘You know what I think?’ he said, leaning in and reasserting eye contact with her. ‘I think you knew who I was all along last night and decided you’d play me then leave me hanging in the hope I’d be so pleased to see you the next day I’d take your side over Jez’s and you’d get the Breakfast Show you’ve always wanted.’
She gripped the table in anger. ‘My God, who made you so paranoid?’
Clearly this was entirely the wrong thing to say because the expression on his face became fierce enough to melt steel.
‘I’ve more reason to believe Jeremy’s version of events right now.’
Her heart leapt in her chest and blood pounded in her head as she tried to get her next comeback straight through a fog of tiredness and tension. ‘So, by your logic, just because I wanted to sleep with you, I must have made up the accusation about Jez pestering me to have sex with him again?’
There was a stunned silence as he looked at her, the corner of his mouth kicking up into a sardonic smile. ‘So you were already sleeping with him.’
She frowned hard and shook her head in frustration, realising her slip-up. ‘Yes. Once. But it was a mistake. Clearly a huge one. He caught me at a weak moment and I regret it.’ She fisted her hands so hard her nails bit into her palms.
‘Because he still wouldn’t give you the Breakfast Show?’
‘No!’
He held up a hand. ‘To be honest, Tallulah, the whole thing sounds like sour grapes to me.’ He tightened his arms across his broad chest. ‘You wanted the Breakfast Show and Jez wouldn’t give it to you, even after you slept with him, so you decided to try every trick in the book to get rid of him so you’d get a clear shot at it.’
She could barely believe those words had just come out of his mouth. She’d thought he was a decent guy, but apparently she’d been very, very wrong about that.
‘You know what I think, Tristan?’ She could barely see straight, she was so offended. ‘I think your father sent his errand boy to do his dirty work and clear up the mess his buddy’s son made by brushing my concerns under the carpet. I never even had a chance to keep my job here because, unlike Jez, I’m not a friend of the family!’
Tristan’s face was like stone, but she could see the anger flickering behind his eyes.
‘You’d better pack up your desk, Tallulah, because I’m taking Jez’s side on this one.’ His voice was calm and flat, but very determined.
‘What?’ The word came out in a rush of air.
‘You need me to spell it out for you?’ He leaned in, bracing both hands against the table, his brow furrowed and his eyes cold. ‘You’re fired.’
FOUR
Tristan stared out of the window after Tallulah walked out, feeling the anger slowly drain out of him. The look of disgust on her face when he’d lost his cool stayed with him like a burn mark on his vision and his stomach clenched with tension as he fought against a deep unease.
He’d never lost his temper with an employee before, but she’d overstepped the mark when she called him paranoid then accused him of being an errand boy.
As if.
He singlehandedly kept the family business afloat these days. If it had been left to his missing in action father or useless brother the whole portfolio would have collapsed around their ears by now. Increasingly, as the years went by, the old man had stopped thinking with his bus
iness head and put all his energy into partying and keeping his kaleidoscope of a love life rotating. In fact, Tristan would go so far as to say he’d turned into a world expert on the pursuit of women.
He remembered with a jolt of discomfort how his father had warned him about his relationship with Marcy at one point, suggesting he should ask her to marry him if he didn’t want to lose her. He’d been so outraged with the patronising meddling he hadn’t spoken to him for weeks. The old bugger had been right about her shaky commitment to him, though—just being with him hadn’t been enough for her; she’d wanted his soul too.
And then Tallulah had swanned in today and chipped away at his already damaged dignity, making him react in an uncharacteristically rash manner.
Why were women hell-bent on reducing him to a heap of rubble?
There was a loud rap on the door and the Station Manager strolled in with a wide, confident smile on his pretty-boy face.
‘Tristan. I’m Jeremy Whatley-Hume—but call me Jez.’ He held out a hand, which Tristan took and shook, albeit diffidently. He didn’t like the guy on sight.
‘Thanks so much for coming in to sort out our little problem.’ Jez gave the last word a flippant slant, as if it hadn’t involved something as important as the altered trajectory of another person’s career.
‘We were meant to be meeting straight after your show finished, Jez,’ Tristan said bluntly, allowing the remnants of his ire from the confrontation with Lu to spill into the tenor of his voice.
‘Sorry about that,’ Jez said, wafting a hand in Tristan’s direction and flopping down into the chair Tallulah had just vacated, propping his feet up on the table and reclining back, not appearing sorry in the least. ‘I had a last-minute meeting with an advertiser. Can’t say no to the moneymen, Tristan,’ he said, flashing what he clearly thought was a look of shrewd camaraderie, but actually made him seem more like a try-hard schoolboy.
Tristan didn’t say anything; instead, he picked up his tablet and tapped some random nonsense into it, making Jez wait until he’d finished before they began the meeting.
