Allegra cast him a look over her shoulder. ‘You weren’t nice about the outfit I wore last night.’
Max had been heating up a curry when she had appeared in the kitchen doorway, wearing the most extraordinary outfit. A riot of clashing colours and patterns, Max hadn’t known how to describe what she was wearing, but when she’d twirled and asked what he thought, he’d made the big mistake of telling her. Words like fruit salad and dog’s dinner had passed his lips.
He wouldn’t be offering any more sartorial advice.
‘Here we are.’ Fretfully, Allegra pushed him into the studio. ‘Just...nod and smile. And follow my lead,’ she muttered under her breath, fixing a bright smile to her face and dragging Max towards a tiny, imperious figure with close-cropped grey hair, huge red spectacles and a red and white dotted bow tie.
‘You didn’t tell me I’d have to be careful not to step on him,’ Max murmured and Allegra hissed at him to be quiet.
‘Dickie, I’m so thrilled to be working with you,’ she said, practically curtseying.
Dickie nodded regally, and they exchanged the obligatory air kiss before he turned his gaze to Max. ‘And oo iz thees?’ he said, his French accent so thick that Max thought he had to be putting it on.
‘Max Warriner,’ he said, stepping forward and shaking Dickie’s hand firmly before Allegra could pretend that he was a deaf mute. He sure as hell wasn’t going to kiss Dickie. ‘Good to meet you,’ he said briskly.
Dickie looked at his hand as if he had never had it wrung before, and then at Allegra, who smiled apologetically.
‘Max is here for the Making Mr Perfect feature,’ she said, lowering her voice. ‘You know, the one with the complete makeover.’
‘Ah, oui...’ Dickie eyed Max’s outfit, a perfectly serviceable suit and tie, and shuddered extravagantly. ‘I see ’e needs one!’
‘It’s the first date tonight,’ Allegra said. ‘He’s meeting Darcy King for cocktails at Xubu.’
Xubu, as Max had heard at length, was the latest hot ticket, the place to see and be seen, and Allegra had been desperate to go. Fortunately—for her, if not for Max—Darcy King’s celebrity had opened the doors and Allegra was delighted.
‘I don’t see why you’re so happy,’ Max had said. ‘You’re not going.’
‘Of course I have to be there,’ Allegra said. ‘I’m writing the article. And the photographer will be there too.’
‘It doesn’t sound like much of a date to me,’ Max grumbled, but Allegra had brushed that aside.
‘It’ll be fun!’
Fun. Max shook his head, thinking about it.
‘You can see how much work he needs,’ Allegra was saying to Dickie, who was circling Max with much rolling of eyes and shrugging of shoulders. ‘He’ll need a whole new look if he’s going to impress Darcy.’
‘I will do what I can,’ he said, plucking at Max’s jacket with distaste. ‘But zis, zis must go! And ze shirt—if you can call zat zing a shirt—and ze trousers...ze shoes too... Burn it all!’
‘Now hold on—!’ Max began, only to yelp as Allegra placed her heel firmly on his foot.
‘Don’t worry, Dickie. I’ll take care of it. Take off your jacket,’ she ordered Max out of the corner of her mouth.
‘This is my work suit!’ he muttered back as he took it off reluctantly. ‘Don’t you dare burn it.’
‘Don’t panic. I’ll just take it home where it doesn’t upset Dickie.’
‘What about upsetting me?’
Allegra ignored him. ‘What sort of look do you think for cocktails?’ she asked Dickie. ‘Funky? Or suave and sophisticated?’
Dickie stood back and studied Max critically, mentally stripping him of the offending clothes, and Max shifted self-consciously.
‘I zink sophisticated, but with an edge,’ Dickie proclaimed at last.
‘Perfect,’ said Allegra, the traitor. ‘Not too obvious, but interesting. A look that shows Darcy he’s confident enough to make his own fashion statement? A little quirky, perhaps?’
Fashion statement? Jeez...Max pinched the bridge of his nose as Allegra and Dickie talked over him. He should be checking the material testing results, or writing up the geological survey for the motorway-widening bid, not standing here like a dumb ox while they wittered on about fashion statements!
‘Quirky?’ Dickie considered. ‘Per’aps you ’ave somezing zere...’
Max was convinced now that the French accent was put on. No one could really speak that ridiculously.
Although, for a man prepared to wear that bow tie, being ridiculous obviously wasn’t a problem.
‘What do you think?’ Allegra asked anxiously. ‘Can you do something with Max?’
For answer, Dickie spun on his heel and clapped his hands at his minions, who had been waiting subserviently, talking to each other in hushed voices as they waited for the great man to pronounce.
‘Bring out ze shirts,’ he ordered.
‘Behave,’ Allegra whispered in Max’s ear.
‘I am behaving!’
‘You’re not. You’re glaring at Dickie. Do you want me glaring at Bob Laskovski over that dinner?’
‘No,’ he admitted.
‘Well, then.’
Allegra could see Max balking as racks of clothes surrounded him like wagons and Dickie started snapping his fingers at his assistants, who leapt forward and held up shirts side by side. Max’s eyes were rolling nervously like a spooked horse and he practically had his ears flattened to his head, but Allegra stood behind Dickie and mouthed ‘remember the dinner’ at him until he sulkily complied and agreed to try on some shirts.
Unbuttoning his cuffs, he hooked his fingers into the back of his shirt and dragged it over his head and Allegra and Dickie both drew a sharp breath. Who would have guessed that Max had such a broad, smooth, sexy back beneath that dull shirt? Allegra felt quite...unsettled.
Dragging her eyes away, she made a big deal of making notes of Dickie’s choices in her notebook, but her gaze kept snagging on the flex of Max’s muscles as he shrugged in and out of shirts. Dickie kept turning him round—deliberately, Allegra was sure—so sometimes she saw his shoulders, sometimes his chest. And then they brought on the trousers, and there were his bare legs. Why had she never noticed before what great legs Max had?
‘Allegra!’ Dickie snapped his fingers in front of her face, startling her. ‘What do you think?’
Allegra looked at Max. He wore a darkly flowered button-down shirt with a striped tie that clashed and yet complemented the colours perfectly. Trousers and jacket were beautifully cut, shoes discreet. If it hadn’t been for the mutinous expression, he would have looked super-cool.
‘I love it,’ she said. ‘He’s really rocking that flowered shirt.’
Max hunched a shoulder. ‘I feel like a prat.’
‘Well, you don’t look like one for once,’ she said.
‘He needs an ’aircut of course,’ said Dickie, eyeing Max critically.
Allegra checked her list. ‘That’s booked in next.’
‘And a manicure.’
‘Oh, no,’ said Max, backing away. ‘No, no, no, no, no!’
‘Yes, indeed.’ Allegra