It didn’t help that she still felt Heath all around her. The scent of his aftershave lingered on her hair as the night before he had used her wrap as a prop when he’d been doing an impersonation of one of his four sisters. She could still taste sweet chilli sauce on her tongue from the kebab they had shared. And every time she closed her eyes, she could see Heath’s crinkly eyes and smiling, tanned face imprinted there.
‘Umm, maybe Barnaby, the visual merchandiser,’ she said, plucking a name from the furthest recesses of her mind. ‘He would be willing to marry me for rent-free accommodation here. Apparently his favourite gay bar is just around the corner.’
‘So why didn’t you run away with him?’ Louise asked, and Jodie no longer felt like hugging her clever sister.
Mandy grinned at Louise. ‘She makes a good point.’
‘I…I’d had enough by the time Heath came along. If I had to ask one more guy to tell me about himself, I was going to drown myself in a whole bottle of red wine.’
‘Oh, balderdash,’ Lisa said. ‘You fell over when I brought Heath to your table, Jodes.’
‘My foot had fallen asleep,’ she argued.
‘Please! No part of a woman’s body could possibly sleep through that. He was gorgeous.’ This time Lisa got the full-stare treatment from all three girls. ‘Well, he was.’
Jodie raked both hands through her hair. ‘Okay. Fine. He was gorgeous. But he comes from a family of seven. After growing up in the middle of London with my crazy mother my only known relative, I’ve only just discovered I have a half-sister.’
Jodie glanced at Louise, who smiled warmly back. Okay, so hugging was back on the family agenda.
‘Besides which,’ Jodie continued, ‘he lives on a farm, and I live here. And I want to stay here. And he wants…’ She wasn’t really sure what he wanted. They had never really discussed it; they had both had too much of a nice time specifically not talking specifics.
‘What does he want?’ Lisa asked.
‘What he deserves is the real deal.’
Mandy shook her head in utter confusion, while Lisa looked at her with too much understanding for Jodie’s comfort.
‘So what next?’ Lisa asked, kindly pinning the attention elsewhere. ‘Do we tell Barnaby the gay visual merchandiser the happy news?’
Somehow Jodie couldn’t rouse any excitement for the idea. ‘Maybe not just yet.’
‘Right. That’s the spirit!’ Mandy ran to the desk in the corner and clicked on the Internet connection. ‘Let’s first see what new men the night has brought us.’
Though it was the last thing she wanted to do, Jodie moved to look over Mandy’s shoulder. And, oh, what choices she had! A lawyer with three teenaged children, a baker looking for a morning person, and a guy who had been on the dole for eight years while he ran a campaign to legalise marijuana in his ‘spare time’.
Time was running out. The calendar above the computer with its bright red crosses showed how little time she did have until The Day She Had To Leave. That decided it for her—she would choose by the end of that day.
Barnaby, Scott, or Heath.
For Heath was still on the maybe list whether she admitted it to the girls or not.
After driving her home the night before, he had walked her to the front door of her apartment building. Shadows and moonlight had slanted across his strong face as they had stood facing one another beneath the ivy-trellised alcove. Her skin still tingled from the feel of his smooth cheek against hers as he had kissed her goodnight.
‘Can I see you again?’ he had asked, his deep voice washing over her.
Jodie’s cheeks flushed pink as she remembered the moment the romantic young girl she had once been before life had beaten her down, the young girl who had spent many a night wishing on the first star, had risen up and answered him with, ‘I would like that.’
The phone rang and, saved by the bell, Jodie leapt for it so fast the phone flew out of her hand. It took some world-class juggling to make sure it didn’t fall.
‘Who-yello!’ she said when she pulled it to her ear.
‘Jodie.’
She knew that voice in an instant. Heath. The deep vibrations tickled through her hand, down her arm and into her stomach.
‘Oh,’ she gasped. ‘Hi. Hang on a sec, will you?’
She shoved a hand over the mouthpiece and climbed over the back of the couch. ‘It’s for me. I’ll take it while I’m having a bath. Two birds with one stone and all that. So save me some Brie. Right? Okay.’
She ran into the bathroom, cringing at the mixed looks of bewilderment and perception on her friends’ faces.
‘Heath. I’m back,’ she said once she had closed the door and heard the girls’ voices start up in conversation.
‘And bathing, I hear.’
‘Oh, no,’ she said, feeling her cheeks pink. ‘Not yet. Fully clothed over here.’
‘Pity,’ he said, taking his time to let the word go.
‘I wasn’t expecting to hear from you again. So soon,’ she added belatedly.
‘Well, I do have to be home again in four hours,’ Heath said, ‘so I thought it best to spend my short time here wisely. Asking you to have morning tea with me feels like the wisest move I’ve made in a long time. A kind of reciprocation for the two-a.m. kebab.’
To block out her conversation, Jodie sat on the edge of the bath and turned on the old taps before pouring in excessive amounts of strawberry bath bubbles. She breathed in deep through her nose as she tried to decide what to do.
On the up side, she and Heath got on well. Ridiculously well. And that was important. What use would it be wasting two years of her life living with someone who drove her around the bend?
But on the down side, Heath Jameson was also charming and way too attractive for comfort. And for that exact reason she ought not to take it any further. She wanted a two-year husband, not a boyfriend. These next two years would be instrumental in her continued self-discovery, and she could not possibly achieve that if her time was spent with someone to whom she felt connected. For Jodie was a woman who had never learnt how to sever connections, no matter how self-destructive they might be.
‘So?’ he finally asked when she had stalled too long. ‘Are you up for it? Has the kebab digested enough that it’s time for a refill?’
Jodie slid her back further down the wall until her knees were level with her nose. Her stomach did feel empty, hollow, and tingling, but that was only half the reason she gave in and said, ‘Yeah, I’m up for it.’
She gave in because she had to let him off the hook face to face. He was worthy of that.
‘Great. I’ll pick you up in fifteen,’ he said.
He was gone before Jodie had the chance to explain to him that she would meet him downstairs. There was no way she was going to let the girls know that she was seeing him again. It was bad enough that she knew that she was fast becoming enchanted by the guy. If they had any inkling, they might just try to talk her out of letting him go.
Fourteen minutes later, bathed and dressed in track pants, a white T-shirt and sneakers, Jodie sidled out into the kitchen.
‘Brunch is ready,’ Louise said, waving a French stick and a round of Brie at her.
‘Not for me.’ She placed the phone casually back on the cradle.
Lisa took one look at her garb and lifted two shocked