‘So you’re just going to hide out here for the next twelve months?’
Yes.
‘No. I’m going to take a year off life to just get back to who I really am. To avoid men altogether and just remember what I liked about being by myself.’ The idea blew across her mind like the leaves on the gravel path ahead of them. But it felt very right. ‘It will be the year of Georgia.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘The year of Georgia?’
‘To please no one but me.’ To find herself again. And see how she felt about herself when left alone in a room with no one else to fill the space.
‘Well, then, think about how much you could do for yourself with a blank cheque behind you.’
It was a seductive image. All those things she’d always wanted to do—secretly—and never had the courage or the money to do. She could do them. At least some of them.
‘What would you do,’ he went on, sensing the shift in his fortune, ‘if money was no object?’
Build that time machine... ‘I don’t know. Self-improvement, learn a language, swim the English Channel?’
That got his attention. ‘The Channel, really?’
She shrugged. ‘Well, I’d have to learn how to swim first...’
Suddenly he was laughing. ‘The Year of Georgia. We could mix it up. Get a couple of experts to help us out with some ideas.’ Grey eyes blazed into hers. ‘Fifty thousand pounds, Georgia. All for you.’
She stared at him. For an age. ‘Actually, I really just want all of this to go away. Can fifty grand buy that?’
The compassion returned. It flickered across his eyes and then disappeared. ‘Not literally, but there’s an extra-special level of feeding-frenzy that the public reserves for those not wanting the attention. Maybe fronting up to it will be a way to help end it?’
That made some sense. There was a seedy kind of fervour to the interest of the English public specifically because she and Dan were both trying so hard to avoid it. Maybe it tapped into the ancient predator parts of mankind, as if they were scenting a kill.
‘You were willing to sell us your marriage before,’ he summed up. ‘Why not sell us your recovery? How is it different?’
‘Sharing the happiest time of my life with the world would have been infinitely different.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Is that what you thought? That marrying him would make you happy?’
‘Of course.’ But then she stumbled. ‘Happier. You know, still happy.’
It sounded lame even to her own ears.
‘Clearly Bradford thought otherwise.’ Then he took a breath. ‘Why did you ask him if you weren’t certain of his answer?’
Her brow folded. ‘Because we’d been together for a year.’
‘A year in which he thought you were both just enjoying each other’s company.’
For a moment she’d forgotten—again—how very public her proposal was. And Dan’s decline. Three million listeners had heard every excruciating word. She hid her shame by dropping her gaze to the path ahead of them.
‘So...what? His twelve-month expiry date was approaching?’
She lifted her eyes again. ‘It was your promotion, Mr Rush. “Give him a leap year nudge,” you said in all your advertising.’
His eyes flicked away briefly. ‘We didn’t imagine anyone would take us literally.’
She stared at him as a small cluster of walkers passed by. Her friend’s illness was none of his business. Nor was Kelly’s eagerness to see a happy ever after for two people she loved. ‘I misunderstood something someone close to him said,’ she murmured.
Actually her mistake was in hearing what she wanted to hear. And letting her mother’s expectations get to her. Her desperate desire to fill the void in her life with grandchildren. And then she’d awoken to EROS’ promotion and decided it was some kind of sign.
And when she’d been shortlisted and then selected...well...
Clearly it was meant to be.
And exactly none of those was even close to being a good excuse.
‘I accept full responsibility for my mistake, Mr Rush—’
‘Zander.’
‘—and I’ll need to seek some legal advice before answering you about the contract.’
‘Of course.’ He fished a business card from his pocket and handed it to her. ‘You’d be foolish not to.’
Which was a polite, corporate way of suggesting she’d been pretty foolish already.
It was hard to argue.
* * *
‘I think you should do it,’ Kelly said, distracted enough that Georgia could well imagine her stirring a pot full of alphabet spaghetti in one hand, ironing a small school uniform with the other, and with the phone wedged between her ear and shoulder.
A normal day in her household.
‘I thought for sure you’d tell me where he could stick his offer,’ she said.
Kelly laughed. ‘If not for those magic words...’
Fifty thousand pounds.
‘You say magic words and I hear magic beans. I think this has the potential to grow into something really all-consuming.’
‘So? Did you have any other plans for the next twelve months?’
The fact it was true—and that Kelly didn’t mean to be unkind—didn’t stop it hurting all the same. No, she had no particular plans that twelve months of fully paid stuff would interrupt. Which was a bit sad.
‘George, listen. I don’t want to bore you again with my life-is-for-the-living speech, but I would take this in a heartbeat if someone offered it to me.’
‘Why? There’s nothing wrong with you. You don’t need reinvention.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with you. This doesn’t have to be about that. This is an opportunity to do all the things you’ve put aside your whole life while you’ve been working and saving so hard. To live a little.’
‘You know why I work as hard as I do.’
‘I know. The whole “as God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again” thing. But you are not your mother, George. You are more financially secure than most people your age. Isn’t there any room in your grand plan for some fun?’
She blinked, wounded both by Kelly’s too-accurate summation of her entire life’s purpose and by the implication of her words. ‘I’m fun.’
Kelly’s gentle laugh only scored deeper. ‘Oh, love. No, you’re not. You’re amazing and smart and very interesting to be around, but you’re about as much fun as Dan is. That’s what made you two so—’
Kelly sucked her careless words back in. ‘What I’m saying is, you have nothing to lose. Take this man’s fifty grand and spoil yourself. Consider it a consolation prize for not getting to marry my stupid brother.’
‘He’s not stupid, Kel,’ she whispered. ‘He just doesn’t love me.’
In the silence that followed, two little boys shrieked and carried on in the background. ‘Well, I love you, George, and as your friend I’m telling you to take the money and run. You won’t get a chance like this