‘Advice? Advice about what?’ She felt as if the ground had unexpectedly opened up from under her feet. ‘Relationships? Is he some kind of counsellor or something?’
‘Harry Sidwell has never needed advice on relationships! He’s in finance, Mats. Powerful man. Even I’ve heard of him and you know how much distance there is between the underbelly of life here and the Olympic heights of some of those money men.’ He chuckled at his own sense of humour but Mattie’s head was reeling with shock.
‘You’re giving me the night off because some man asked you to and handed over a business card? And what about my tips, Harry? I can’t afford to take the time off! You know how much I need the money!’
‘I’ll cover you, Mats. Give you roughly the amount you usually pull in on a Friday. Don’t say I’m not fair.’
‘I can’t—’
‘You deserve a night off, Mattie. Reliable as clock-work, you are. Never let me down. When was the last time you went out for enjoyment? Eh? When you’re not at college or poring over textbooks, you’re here. And you’d be doing me a favour, love.’
‘How’s that, Harry?’
‘Thinking of expanding business, Mats. Might need that business card sooner than you think.’ He grinned craftily, and Mattie felt her options closing in.
‘He’s after one thing, Harry. Thanks very much!’
‘You’re safe with that one.’
‘I wouldn’t be safe with anybody who comes here, and you know it!’
‘You’re safe with that one, Mats. I wouldn’t be giving you the evening off otherwise. He’s a big cheese. He wouldn’t make a nuisance of himself because he’s too high-profile. Would never risk a scandal. If he says he wants to talk, then that’s all he’ll do. Unless…’
‘Unless what?’
‘Unless you decide otherwise…’
‘Fat chance.’
‘Then what’s the problem? Free evening? Enjoy yourself. Now, you go change, darling. Busy, busy, busy here tonight. No time to stop and have a prolonged chat.’
But she didn’t like the feeling of being manipulated. Even if it did feel good to have an evening to herself. No books, no nightclub. No Frankie.
If she got to the door and discovered that he had changed his mind, all the better. She’d play truant and skip one evening’s work and find herself some twenty-four-hour place where she could just sit and be at peace with her thoughts. Going back to the house was not an option, even though Frankie wouldn’t be there. Just being within those four walls was enough to make her feel suffocated.
But he was there. Waiting. Just as he had promised. Tall, impossibly handsome and looking at her with an expression she couldn’t read, which made her feel more apprehensive rather than less. Apprehensive and somehow…alert. Alive.
‘How did you pull that off?’ was the first thing she asked, glaring.
Like an angry cat, he thought. An angry cat that he had got it into his head he wanted to tame. An angry cat that would jump six feet into the air if he so much as touched her, even if the touch was strictly polite. He pushed open the door and stood back so that she could brush past him.
‘Didn’t Harry tell you?’ Dominic asked curiously, making sure not to invade her space.
‘He said you gave him your business card. He said you were someone important in the City.’ Mattie regarded him levelly, with hostile suspicion. ‘I don’t care how important you are, you know the ground rules.’
‘But not your name.’
‘Sorry?’
‘I know the ground rules, but I still don’t know your name.’
‘Matilda.’
‘Matilda. You don’t look like a Matilda,’ he said in an amused voice, and her back stiffened.
‘No. And what do I look like? Something a little fluffier? A Candy, perhaps? Maybe fluffier still?’
‘Are you always on the defensive? Matilda?’
‘Mattie,’ Mattie muttered. ‘Everyone calls me Mattie. I hate the name Matilda.’ She blushed at this unnecessary volunteering of information, even though it was hardly a state secret.
‘Why?’
She shrugged, as he knew she would, just as he knew that she hated having let slip the innocuous detail because it was of a personal nature.
‘Well, Mattie,’ he stretched out one arm to hail a taxi, and as it slowed down to pull up to them he said with deadly seriousness, ‘we’re going to have to get in a cab together to go to this hotel…’
‘Hotel? Oh, no. No, no.’ She began backing away and Dominic clicked his tongue in impatience.
‘I said hotel. I didn’t say hotel room. We’re going to a hotel in Covent Garden that I often use when I’m working late. There’s a bar downstairs and it’s guaranteed to be full.’ But her big green eyes were still watching him warily, and he had to fight the urge to just reach out and smooth her ruffled feathers.
He, who had never had to try when it came to the opposite sex, could scarcely believe that he was now willing, at some ungodly time of the evening, to bide his time.
‘Now, are you going to come with me or not? If not, then you can rest assured that you won’t see me again. If you do decide to come, then you’ll just have to swallow your misgivings and climb into this taxi with me. Make your mind up.’
He saw the debate flitting across her face and wondered what he would do if she walked away. Wondered what had brought him to this juncture in the first place.
Fate? A certain boredom with the women he was used to? A need to erase Rosalind by having an affair with someone dramatically different from her in every possible way? Something else? No, nothing else, he told himself.
But whatever the outcome of her internal debate, he wasn’t going to chase after her. He had already behaved out of character as far as she was concerned, and he wasn’t going to do it again.
‘OK.’ Mattie shrugged and, when she reached out to open the door, found that he was there before her, opening it for her. It was a gesture to which she wasn’t accustomed. Frankie was not an opening-car-doors-for-women kind of man.
Still, she made sure to wriggle up to the furthest side of the seat when he stooped to join her, and was immediately glad of it because, even at this distance, she still felt chokingly aware of him.
‘I don’t know your name,’ she said, as the taxi pulled away.
He noticed the way she was huddled against the door, as if scared that he might do something unexpected at any given moment, and he, in turn, made sure to keep a safe distance between them.
‘Dominic Drecos.’
‘Dominic Drecos,’ Mattie repeated, thinking hard. ‘And you’re something important in the City, are you?’
‘Something important, yes.’ She didn’t sound overly impressed with that and he found himself giving in to a childish desire to expand. ‘I deal in corporate finance. We handle mergers and acquisitions. In addition, I speculate in property. Buy to renovate to sell.’
‘Right.’ She turned to gaze out of the window. In this part of London, it was never dark. Too many lights and billboards. It was a rolling scenery she was familiar with, but for some reason she found