The kiss had shaken her right to the core. Nobody had ever made her feel like that with a single kiss—as if her knees had turned to mush and she needed to cling to him to keep herself upright. It had panicked her into backing away and cracking some inane joke, and the moment was lost.
Since then, she’d been scrupulously polite and distant with Sean. But in unguarded moments she wondered. Had he felt that same pull of attraction? And what if...?
She shook herself. Of course not. Apart from the fact that her judgement when it came to men was totally rubbish, she knew that Sean just saw her as his baby sister’s super-annoying best friend, the woman he ended up bickering with every time they spoke to each other for more than five minutes. It rankled slightly that he still didn’t take her seriously—surely the fact that she’d had her own business for the last three years and kept it going through the recession counted for something?
Then again, she didn’t need to prove anything to him. She was perfectly comfortable with who she was and what she’d achieved.
She finished packing the last box.
‘Any luck with my flight?’ she asked when Sean ended his call.
‘There’s good news and bad,’ he said.
‘OK. Hit me with the bad first.’
He frowned. ‘Why?’
‘Because then I’ve faced the worst, and there’s still something good to look forward to.’
He looked surprised, as if he’d never thought of it in that way before. ‘OK. The bad news is, I can’t get you a flight where they’ll take the dresses on board.’
The worst-case scenario. Well, she’d just have to deal with it. ‘Then if planes are out, I’ll just have to go by train.’ She thought on her feet. ‘If I get the Eurostar to Paris, there’ll be a connecting train to Milan or Rome, and from there to Naples. Though it means I probably won’t get to Capri until tomorrow, now.’
‘Hold on. I did say there was good news as well,’ he reminded her. ‘We can fly to Naples from London.’
She frowned, not understanding. ‘But you just said you couldn’t get me a seat where they’ll take the dresses.’
‘Not on a commercial flight, no. But I have a friend with a private plane.’
‘You have what?’
‘A friend with a private plane,’ he repeated, ‘who’s willing to take us this afternoon.’
‘Us.’ The word hit her like a sledgehammer and she narrowed her eyes at him. ‘Are you saying that you don’t trust me to take the dresses on my own?’
‘You need to go to Naples. I need to go to Naples. So it makes sense,’ he said, ‘for us to travel together.’
She noticed that he hadn’t answered her question. Clearly he didn’t trust her. To be fair to him, she had already lost his sister’s wedding dress—but it hadn’t been entirely her fault. ‘But don’t you already have a flight booked?’
‘I cancelled it,’ he said. ‘I promised Ashleigh I’d be there tonight or I would’ve offered you my original booking and flown in later. This seemed like the best solution to the problem.’
‘You have a friend with a private plane.’ She still couldn’t get over that one. ‘Sean, normal people don’t have friends with private planes.’
‘You barely accept that I’m human, let alone normal,’ he pointed out.
And they were heading towards yet another fight. She grimaced. ‘Sorry. Let’s just rewind and try this again. Thank you, Sean, for coming to the rescue and calling in whatever favour you had to call in to get me a flight to Naples. Please tell your friend that if he ever needs a wedding dress or a prom dress made, I’ll do it for nothing.’
‘I’ll tell her,’ Sean said dryly.
Her. Girlfriend? Probably not, Claire thought. Ashleigh was always saying that Sean would never settle down and never dated anyone for more than three weeks in a row. So maybe it was someone who’d gone to university with him, or a long-standing business acquaintance. Not that she had any right to ask.
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘So what time does the flight leave?’
‘When we want it to, give or take half an hour,’ he said. ‘My car’s outside. I just need to drop it back home and collect my luggage.’ He looked at her. ‘You might as well come with me.’
Gee, what an invitation, Claire thought. But she wasn’t going to pick a fight with him now. He’d already gone above and beyond. It was for Ashleigh’s sake rather than hers, she knew, but she still appreciated it. ‘Ready when you are.’
He drove them back to his house and parked outside. His luggage was in the hallway, so it only took a few seconds for him to collect it; Claire noticed that he didn’t invite her in. Fair enough. It was his space. Though she was curious to know whether his living space was as organised and regimented as the rest of him.
They took the tube through to London City airport. Claire used the noise of the train as an excuse not to make conversation, and she knew that he was doing exactly the same. Being with Sean wasn’t easy. He was so prickly. He had to have a charming side, or he wouldn’t have made such a success of running the family business—clients wouldn’t want to deal with him. But the sweetness of the toffee that Farrell’s produced definitely didn’t rub off on him where Claire was concerned.
The check-in process was much faster than Claire was used to; then again, she didn’t know anyone with a private plane. It was more the sort of thing that a rock star would have, not a wedding dress designer. The plane was smaller than she’d expected, but there was plenty of room to stretch out and the seats were way, way more comfortable than she was used to. She always travelled economy. This was another world.
‘Welcome aboard,’ the pilot said, shaking their hands. ‘Our flight today will be about two and a half hours. If you need anything, ask Elise.’
Elise turned out to be their stewardess.
And, most importantly, Elise stored the dress boxes where Claire could see them. This time, she could be totally sure that none of the dresses would be lost.
‘Do you mind if I...?’ Sean gestured to his briefcase.
Claire would much rather work than make small talk with him, too. ‘Sure. Me, too,’ she said, and took a sketchpad from her bag. She’d had a new client yesterday who wanted a dress at short notice, plus there was the big wedding show in two months’ time—a show where Claire was exhibiting her very first collection, and she was working flat out to get enough dresses ready in time. Six wedding dresses plus the bridesmaids’ outfits to go with each, as well as colour co-ordinating the groom’s outfit with each set. She could really do with an extra twenty-four hours in a day for the next few weeks—twenty-four hours when she didn’t need to sleep. But, as that wasn’t physically possible, she’d have to settle for drinking too much coffee and eating too much sugary stuff to get her through the next few weeks.
* * *
As he worked, Sean was aware of the quick, light strokes of Claire’s pencil against her sketchpad. Clearly she was working on some preliminary designs for someone else’s dress. When the sound stopped, he looked over at her.
She’d fallen asleep mid-sketch, her pencil still held loosely in one hand, and there were deep shadows beneath her eyes.
Right at that moment, she looked vulnerable. And Sean was shocked by the sudden surge of protectiveness.
Since when did he feel protective about Claire Stewart?
That wasn’t something he wanted to think about too closely. So he concentrated on his work and let her