A Girl Less Ordinary

by Leah Ashton

  ‘Okay, so you’ve got a really diverse crowd here tonight. Journalists—Australian and international, representatives of the chains that will stock the phone, Armada staff members, a few random celebrities, and a varied assortment of the general public.’

  ‘And I need to tailor my message for them all,’ he said, and the tension started to ooze back into his body.

  ‘Well, yes and no. The most important thing to remember is to be genuinely excited and enthusiastic about the phone. That type of energy will draw people in.’

  He nodded. That part was easy.

  ‘And, as I said,’ Ella continued, ‘make sure you listen carefully. The journalist from SmartPhone Monthly or whatever will want to hear all about the nuts and bolts of the phone. While the starlet from some afternoon soapie wants to learn about the cool stuff she’ll actually use. You need to tell her how your phone will make her life easier—and make her look ultra fashionable and right on the cutting edge while doing so. You need to frame what you say for your audience.’

  Ella then gave a few examples, but this wasn’t what Jake was really worried about.

  ‘But what about the non-phone stuff,’ he said, ‘the small talk and the gossiping?’

  That was the bit that he’d been dreading. The fawning and the falseness.

  ‘I wouldn’t have picked you as much of a gossip,’ Ella said, with a grin, ‘but you’re not going to have a problem with small talk tonight. I could give you tips to start conversations, like opening with a compliment, but it won’t be necessary. You’re the star attraction tonight, especially after yesterday.’

  Surprisingly—or maybe not, Jake didn’t understand all this campaign stuff at all—the Armada marketing department had not been all that upset by Jake’s minor radio explosion.

  The main gist of it was that it was far from the worst thing that could’ve happened—an all publicity is good publicity kind of situation.

  But they’d made it clear, ever so politely, that it would be preferred if it was a one-off.

  Jake Donner was to promote the phone and not, by his behaviour, to overshadow the product.

  ‘I’m not so sure about that,’ he said. ‘So far tonight no one’s come to speak to me.’

  ‘That’s because your Jake Donner glare would’ve singed off their eyelashes. I reckon people are thinking I deserve a bravery medal for talking to you now.’

  Jake gave a brief, harsh laugh. ‘My disdain for the event must have been more obvious than I’d intended.’

  ‘Much more,’ she said, ‘but that’s okay. It’s easily fixed. You’re looking a lot more approachable now. That little storm cloud of doom seems to have relocated from the space above your head.’

  Because of Ella.

  ‘You just need to keep it up. Think friendly and approachable thoughts or something. And remember to smile. You’ll be fine. You can be quite charming when you put your mind to it.’

  Her gaze dipped again, just for a second or two.

  ‘And if I get any questions I don’t want to answer?’

  ‘Easy. If you can’t or don’t want to, deflect the question, just say “no comment”. In a casual environment like this it’s not as awkward as when you’ve got a camera in your face.’

  He nodded.

  ‘Okay. So people come up and talk to me. I act all enthusiastic and passionate about the phone.’ Ella nodded in encouragement. ‘But then what? Once the phone stuff peters out? I’ve got no intention of pretending to be someone’s best friend when I’ve known them for five minutes. I’m predicting a wave of awkward, long silences.’

  ‘I don’t want you to try and be someone you’re not. People can smell insincerity, not that I think you’re capable of it, anyway. So what I’d suggest, is—’

  ‘Hang on,’ Jake cut in. ‘Back up a little. Did you really just say that you don’t want me to try and be someone I’m not?’

  ‘Yes?’ Ella replied slowly, her forehead wrinkled in confusion. ‘So?’

  ‘Hasn’t that been the whole intent of all this?’ Jake waved his hand up and down his body. ‘For me to become someone

  I’m not?’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ Ella said, with an unexpected bite to her tone. ‘My consulting services assist people to present their best selves.’ Behind her contacts her eyes flashed, and she stepped forward, crowding his personal space. ‘Is that what you think I’ve been doing? Changing you?’

  He looked down at himself. At the unfamiliar clothing and shoes. From the corner of his eye he could see the party heaving around him. This was not the native habitat of Jacob Donner.

  ‘Yes.’

  Ella closed her eyes for a second, and Jake had the sense she was slowly counting to ten. Then her eyes popped open, and she said, rather calmly: ‘Haven’t you been paying any attention at all? Everything—your look, the media training, everything I’ve told you tonight—it’s been all about you. Not about changing you. Giving you the tools to be you in an environment you’re uncomfortable in.’

  As she watched him, frustration stiffening her body, he figured he’d better give her theory at least a moment’s consideration.

  Could she be right?

  He reconsidered his new wardrobe, his new look. If he was honest, there was not one item of clothing that he vehemently disliked. If he was even more honest, each morning, once he’d got over the strangeness of putting on such different clothes, he’d barely noticed them at all. He’d felt comfortable. Just the same as he did every other day.

  Even tonight, in his suit, he felt okay. She’d known he’d never wear a tie. Or shoes with pointy tips. Or skinny-leg trousers. Or put product in his hair.

  He was still Jake Donner. Just a little fancier.

  And really—really—was that such a terrible thing?

  Ella must have seen the exact instant that little cog had turned in his brain, as she smiled—a big triumphant smile.

  ‘See?’ she said. ‘I told you I’m good at my job.’ She paused, softening the smugness in her tone just a little. ‘Can we get back on track, now, please?’

  And then she was off again, with tips and tricks and

  strategies.

  But he wasn’t really paying attention, although he was careful she didn’t notice.

  Because, while he had to concede that Ella was not in the business of making someone pretend to be anything or anyone they weren’t, it was impossible to ignore the one significant exception to that rule.

  She was standing right in front of him.

  * * *

  Jake had been quite insistent that Ella stay by his side during his first forays into the wonderful world of schmoozing and small talk.

  Ostensibly to step in should anything go pear-shaped but Jake was a quick study, and he was doing absolutely fine.

  He would never be the life of the party, but who cared? He certainly had the mysterious, handsome and charming thing down pat. He smiled, he subtly promoted the phone, and he nodded and murmured politely when the conversations shot off in all sorts of strange directions. She had no doubt he was bored out of his brain, of course, but he hid it exceedingly well.

  So far, her professional advice had been limited to a subtle nudge when he’d started to fidget during a particularly long-winded discussion about the relative merits of two exclusive Sydney fine-dining restaurants, and a whispered no comment when he’d started to do his glower thing when questioned about yesterday’s radio interview.

  With little to do but stand beside him and engage in the conversation of the moment, Ella was finding it increasingly difficult to ignore other things.

  Like how she’d felt when he’d first seen her dress and his gaze had as good as caressed her. With just that look, her body had gone white-hot. She’d been so, so aware of him.

  It was stupid to be overwhelmed by his appearance. It was hardly a surprise, after all, given that she’d selected everything he wore. And yet here she was, surprised—because she honestly hadn’t thought it possible for Jake t
o become any more handsome. But it had turned out there was some room left to ratchet up his sexiness quotient and tonight it was at impossibly impossible levels.

  What was it? The glamorous setting, the intimate lighting?

  Yes, that must be it.

  Although, a perfidious little voice inside her insisted it was none of these things. But instead, it had everything to do with whatever had shifted, or changed, or grown between them when they’d laughed together on that Pyrmont street.

  So now, they stood side by side, with something that zipped and zinged between them.

  The official launch came and went, brief, to the point, and right on ‘message’. Jake was doing everything Armada had asked of him, even managing to crack a smile for the bevy of photographers that had appeared like magic as he’d taken to the podium.

  Later, once most of the guests had consumed enough alcohol to lose their inhibitions and hit the dance floor, Jake came and stood beside her. She’d stepped out onto the nearly deserted balcony, her champagne glass balanced on a tall cocktail table beside the railing.

  ‘How do you do it?’ he asked. ‘All this?’

  Her lips quirked. ‘You mean have a good time?’

  ‘I think you know this isn’t my idea of a good time.’

  ‘So what is?’ she asked, curious.

  ‘Coding,’ he answered, quick as a flash.

  Ella smiled fully. Always such a geek.

  Then he shrugged. ‘And, I guess hiking with my dogs up in the mountains. Mountain-bike riding—sometimes with a mate or two. Climbing.’

  ‘Let me guess—in the mountains?’

  Now it was his turn to smile. ‘It’s the best place in the world. I’ve got my own place up there.’

  She knew that, of course. No self-respecting tabloid journalist could let an article go by without some reference to his home. Sydney’s Blue Mountains Billionaire, Software Mogul’s Mountain Hideaway and so on and so forth.

  Ella wrinkled her nose. ‘I know it’s supposed to be beautiful, but I reckon I’d go crazy living that far away from Sydney.’

  ‘I’d go crazy if I lived any closer.’ He rested both hands on the balcony railing, and looked out over the harbour. Beneath them, along the edge of the marina, flowed a steady stream of Friday-night revellers, muffled snippets of their conversations mixing with the heavy bass emanating from the party behind them.

  ‘You still haven’t answered my question,’ he said, after a while. ‘I genuinely want to know—how do you stand this?’

  ‘It’s really not all that complicated,’ she said. ‘It’s fun. It’s the buzz of getting ready. Of meeting new people. Of laughing and chatting and dancing. What isn’t there to love?’

  He shook his head. ‘It’s exhausting.’

  She shrugged. ‘For me it’s the opposite. I’d go mad stuck in my apartment all the time. I need noise, and chatter and people. It gives me energy.’

  ‘But you must need a break, occasionally?’ he asked. He was looking at her as if she were some bizarre software glitch—one that if he stared at long enough would offer up a solution.

  ‘Nope,’ she said. ‘I like to keep myself busy. Most nights I’ve got something on—salsa dancing, Pilates, any classes I feel like taking, or just catching up with friends. Cocktails. Dancing, that kind of thing.’

  He turned, and leaned back against the railing, studying her.

  ‘But that’s new. You used to say you were happiest in your own company. Or, with...’

  Me. With Jake.

  But of course, he’d left.

  Ella laughed, but it sounded about as artificial as it was. ‘Ah, the words of a girl not invited to any parties, and with no money to go shopping or to riding lessons.’

  ‘Really?’ he said, the word a little hollow. A beat later she realised exactly what he was thinking.

  ‘Oh! I don’t mean I didn’t like hanging out with you. You were my best friend.’ It felt bizarre to say something like that, something so juvenile, to the tall, dark and devastatingly handsome man before her. But it had been true. He’d been her best friend, her only friend. ‘But, you know, I also kind of wondered what it would be like to be one of the popular girls.’ She held her hands up in a helpless gesture. ‘What can I say? I guess it’s kind of natural to want what you can’t have.’

  It was a cliché, a nothing, thoughtless sentence, and yet it was as if they both temporarily stopped breathing.

  What they both wanted suddenly made the air between them impossibly thick with delicious, un-ignorable tension.

  ‘What did you want, Ella?’

  Oh, that wasn’t fair. He knew. She’d told him a very long time ago.

  The memory still had the power to make every last remnant of awkward, shy Eleanor want to cringe, then run away and hide.

  ‘What do you want, Ella?’

  What did she want, right now? Out here, alone with Jake on the balcony, the lights of the Sydney CBD towering and twinkling above them, the beat of the music—or was it something else?—making every cell in her body thrum, and pulse and hum?

  ‘I—’

  A high-pitched feminine squeal obliterated the moment before Ella was even absolutely sure what she’d been going to say.

  No, that was a lie. She’d known. But she wasn’t going to admit to it now.

  He was from a past she would never revisit. He’d hurt her, once. So much.

  She couldn’t let that happen again.

  Beside them, a woman in a sequined dress staggered to the rail, a man with messy hair and rolled up shirtsleeves holding her up or maybe it was the other way around. ‘Great night!’ he slurred, with a nod of greeting.

  Ella carefully straightened her shoulders. Not that she needed another reason to come to her senses, but Jake was still her client. And she was, technically, working right now.

  ‘Ella?’ he said. ‘You were saying?’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, hoping she sounded as flippant and carefree as she intended as she deliberately rewound to his earlier question. ‘Of course I wanted what every unpopular girl wants. A date with the most popular boy at school. Preferably to the school ball.’ She managed a smile. ‘That’s what always happened in all those books I read, or the movies—that scene at the end on the dance floor, so I’d always secretly hoped...’

  She was making this up as she went along. Yes, she’d envied the other girls. Yes, she’d wanted the date to the ball.

  But it was always Jake who starred in her daydreams.

  ‘Should we go back inside?’ she said. ‘It’s not too late to squeeze in some more schmoozing, I’m sure.’

  Jake didn’t answer. Instead, he was looking at her in a way that made the hairs at the back of her neck stand on end.

  ‘Jake?’

  He reached out, wrapping his much larger hand around hers. His touch shot sensation shivering along her spine, then right down to her French-manicured toes.

  He pushed away from the railing, then tugged her along behind him as he headed back inside.

  For a few paces she followed, struck somewhat dumb, but then she quite literally dug her heels in, right where the wooden decking of the balcony met the polished boards of the restaurant.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  He looked back at her over his shoulder, the lights from inside throwing half his face into shadow.

  ‘I thought we could recreate that scene. On the dance floor.’

  Ella shook her head, horror warring with disloyal anticipation. ‘Don’t be stupid,’ her sensible self managed. ‘This is no school ball, and you certainly weren’t the most popular boy in my year.’

  ‘It’s close enough. We’ve got the dance floor, and there’s even a disco ball. Plus—you’re the one who called me the star attraction tonight, remember? Tonight I am the popular guy.’

  She tried again. ‘But why?’

  He blinked, as if he hadn’t even considered this. Eventually, he spoke. ‘Maybe I also wanted things that could never have been.’ />
  His gaze didn’t move from hers while he waited for her response.

  After what felt like an eternity, she nodded.

  And followed him back inside.

  CHAPTER TEN

  REALITY, ice cold and unyielding, hit about five steps later.

  What on earth was she doing?

  She needed to stop this. Now.

  ‘Jake?’ she said. But her voice was lost in the dull roar of conversation and the near hypnotic beat of the music.

  Or maybe Jake was just ignoring her.

  She couldn’t make a scene. The place was crawling with journalists, desperate for a story about the mysterious and deeply private Jake Donner.

  She couldn’t do that to him—or to her. The last thing she needed was the media linking her and Jake together. Their shared past was then only a short hop, skip and jump away.

  What to do, what to do?

  Her brain had deserted her. Years of knowledge used to instruct others how to politely extract themselves from awkward conversations and situations had, to all intents and purposes, completely evaporated.

  She had nothing. Her database of gracious refusals was returning no results.

  Oh, God, now even her metaphors were tainted by Jake.

  Somehow they’d reached the dance floor, Ella’s hand still encased in Jake’s.

  Okay. She had a new plan.

  The music was not slow. Not even close. In fact, it bore a far greater resemblance to the soundtrack expected at a Kings Cross nightclub than a slow dance at a Year Twelve Ball.

  So she’d just dance for a few minutes with a respectable distance between them. Relocate her ability to form coherent sentences. Then leave.

  No problem.

  The odds rocketed up highly in favour of her plan succeeding when Jake dropped her hand. No longer could his touch muddle with her synapses.

  But then he smiled at her, and that had much the same effect as his touch.

  The floor was so packed that dancing wasn’t truly a possibility, so they both kind of shuffled to the beat while facing each other. Jake was looking at her, but she made a point of looking anywhere and everywhere except straight back at him.