Cara tugged at her born-again dress, patted down her curls, took a deep breath, and headed inside.
Adam sat upstairs in the top-floor foyer of the television station, cracking his knuckles.
He could have waited in the car. He could have browsed in the shop windows near the television station. He could have taken advantage of the heretofore unheard-of spare time and chosen to stop and smell the flowers in the park nearby. But he hadn’t. He wanted to be where Chris was. And since Chris had been taken into a closed-door meeting, the foyer was as close as he was going to get.
After a good hour spent counting tiles on the ceiling of the open-plan waiting room Adam was itching to leave. And to take Chris with him. If there was even the slightest hint that Chris might change his mind, Adam wanted to be there to snap him up and take him back to the real world of stock prices and innovative technologies. A quantifiable world that never pretended to be anything other than what it was.
So Adam waited close to the source, his knuckles cracking, his eyes seeking out any movement that passed his way.
Cara checked her reflection in the lift doors.
She lifted a hand to pat down her hair. She was pleased to see the new caramel highlights in her curly chestnut bob gave her the exact hint of sophistication she was after. The huge red flower that held her hair back was securely fastened but still she dug it in deeper. It would be just like her to have the thing fall out of her hair and dangle at an illogical angle down her back for the whole day without her knowing, her intelligence and talent and new caramel highlights becoming blurred behind her often clumsy exterior.
Her best friends called her ‘classy Cara’ because she was always so put together, but it was also half a joke since they knew what it took for her to be that way.
She looked down at her unforgettable shoes for moral support. It took almost all of her concentration to remain upright, they were so high and delicate. And she was someone who had to lift her feet so as not to trip even when walking in bare feet.
The lift grumbled to a halt on the top floor and her stomach dropped away. At the last minute she closed her eyes, tapped the heels of her red shoes together and made a wish to whichever good fairies might have been listening.
‘Let me have this job and I will never want anything else again.’
The lift doors opened, as did her eyes, and she stepped ahead, unforgettable red shoes leading the way.
Adam looked up at the whir of the lift.
A woman exited, walking like a ballerina: head held high, shoulders back, deliberate, as if she had a book on her head and had no intention of letting that book fall.
This woman had enough going for her that Adam stopped cracking his knuckles and let his hands drift to rest casually across the back of the couch.
She stopped outside the lift and checked the staff listings, bending slightly from the waist and affording Adam a nice view of…a very nice view. Seeming satisfied she was in the right place, she walked his way.
Only when she came closer did he notice evidence of nerves. She swallowed too many times, her eyes flitting about the place as if she was cataloguing everything in the room, and her knuckles showed white against the sleek black portfolio she clutched in her hands like a lifeline.
Finally her fluttery gaze cut his way.
She managed half a smile, her smooth full lips kicking up at one side, highlighting the sexiest little smile line along one pale cheek.
‘Excuse me,’ she said in a charmingly husky voice, ‘but is this the place to wait for the guys from…?’ She paused, her mouth closing in an adorable little pout as she found the words she was looking for. ‘I don’t even know what it’s called. The new TV dating show?’ A concerned crease appeared above her dainty nose as she awaited his answer.
‘This is the place,’ he said, drawing his eyes from the crease to her blinking eyes. Green, they were, and magnetic. Like a cat’s eyes.
‘Oh, thank goodness,’ she said, a slim hand moving to her chest while her cat’s eyes went back to their dazzled flickering. ‘I’ve had one heck of a time finding where to go. Seems it’s all so secretive most of the staff in the building knew nothing about it. But after my bumbling efforts I’m sure the whole place knows by now.’
She took a seat on the opposite couch, sitting upright, with her portfolio still clutched in her hands.
‘Are you here to be interviewed?’ he asked.
‘That I am. And I can’t believe how nervous I feel. I’ve never done anything like this before.’
Ready to ask, Like what exactly? Adam suddenly realised that this woman could be one of Chris’s dates. And his first uncensored thought was that Chris was a lucky guy. Adam shifted in his seat, suddenly feeling a mite uncomfortable in the woman’s sparkling presence.
Then he also remembered that none of the women was to know whom they were going to be meeting on the show. Just some guy, some poor slob hankering for a woman. Not his friend Chris; sweet guy and a billionaire.
But the funny thing was this woman seemed like a sweet girl too. A sweet girl with eyes that deserved a double take and a mouth that begged to be kissed.
Adam shook his head to clear the muddy thoughts. What did it matter that she was seriously attractive? He was only finding himself so quickly riveted by her because of any possible harm she might bring to Chris.
It was a defence mechanism. That was all.
Chris was too nice to know what was best for him and it was Adam’s job to look out for the guy. He owed him that much. If not everything.
The door to the offices beyond opened, and a young, hip television-exec type, with unironed clothes and too much gel in his hair, popped his head out.
‘Cara Marlowe?’
Adam’s lady friend stood up.
‘That’s me.’
‘Great,’ the guy said with an encouraging smile. ‘Come on through.’
The woman shot Adam a parting grin that included the sexy smile line once more. ‘Wish me luck.’
Luck meant that within days this fresh-faced, sweet and seriously compelling woman could be dating his best friend. And he found that all he could say was, ‘Go get ’em.’
Cara followed the young guy, whose name was Jeff, through a maze of corridors and cubicles to his office within the bowels of the top floor of the television station.
‘Take a seat,’ he ordered.
She did.
‘Coffee?’
‘Ah, no, thanks.’ With caffeine in her veins she’d be bouncing off the walls in no time.
‘I’m not so good as you,’ Jeff said, waving his empty mug at her. ‘I’ll be back in a sec.’
Cara sat upright on the plain simple chair as she waited for Jeff to return. She stared down at her red shoes, which glistened prettily back at her. And she winced. Jeff had walked ahead of her the whole time and she was sure he had not even glanced at her feet once.
But the guy in the foyer had. She was sure of that. In fact she was sure he had compiled an internal data file of every inch of her, so intense had been his gaze. It was all she had been able to do to keep her footing. New shoes or no new shoes. A guy like that would make any rational woman’s knees go weak without even trying.
He had dark wavy hair, intense blue eyes, a solid build, hands that looked as though they could play the piano and change a light bulb. He was a hunk and a half. She wondered briefly what he was doing there, waiting in the foyer where those involved with the new secret show had been told to wait.
What if he was