Dating Mr. December Read online

  ***

  Later that evening, Will hadn’t even got past the main course at the Coleridge farmhouse before he found out that if he wanted to cure his addiction to Emma, he was looking in the wrong place. Cozy domesticity on a plate. Love and sex—personified by Max’s wife’s, Francine’s, swollen stomach, which tonight, he found strangely beautiful. In fact, he found himself longing to stretch out his hand and lay it on the taut skin of her abdomen. Hell, what was the matter with him? Surely he wasn’t feeling broody? Guys don’t have biological clocks, he told himself. Still, as he saw Max, resting his hand proudly on his wife’s bump, Will felt a pang of longing he had no desire to acknowledge.

  He tried to focus on the wine glass in his hand, a blush Zinfandel that glistened on the sides of the glass as shiny as Emma’s lip gloss, or her eyes, as she’d gazed up at him on the mountain…

  ‘Penny for them?’

  He looked up from his glass—his ears registered that someone had been speaking to him but he had no idea what they’d said. Emma had taken over his thoughts once again.

  ‘What’s up, Will? You’ve been staring at that glass as if it had poison in it. Are you still worried about getting the outdoor center idea past the planners?’

  ‘No, Max. Not really. Though it’s going to be tricky. We’ve got some opposition and there’s a chance it might go for developers if we’re really unlucky.’

  Francine laid her knife and fork across her plate. ‘It’s not this calendar, is it? Max has told me all about it, you know.’ She turned a dazzling smile and a pair of dark French eyes on him. ‘I hear we are going to see a lot more of you when it is finished.’

  Will shook his head and laughed. ‘Why on earth would I be bothered about that?’

  Max was in a provocative mood. ‘You’re going to be on the top shelf of all the newsagents in the Lakes in a few months’ time, mate. Probably the local papers too. I’m not sure I’d want my white bits lusted at by all and sundry.’

  ‘In your dreams, Max.’

  ‘Ah. So it’s a pride thing? You really don’t mind being pinned up on the wall of someone’s tea shop? Or at the local WI Hall?’

  ‘I shall buy at least ten copies and I shall put them up in the ante-natal clinic as warning,’ said Francine.

  An indulgent smile curved his lips. He couldn’t be annoyed with Francine even if she was pushing her luck.

  ‘You buy as many as you want, Francine. Buy the whole lot, if you can, and burn them for me,’ he said lightly. ‘But don’t put them up on any walls—not unless you want to put your friends off men for good.’

  Reaching for the wine bottle, he found it was nearly empty. ‘Max, get this clear. I couldn’t care less about being seen with my kit off. I just happen to think it’s totally the wrong image for the squad. We’re trying to appear professional, not a bunch of attention-seeking jokers. There’s no need for it, as you well know—I did offer to fund the center.’

  Max shook his head. ‘You can’t go round solving people’s problems single-handed, mate. Give them a chance to help themselves.’

  ‘But whose idea was the calendar? Bob’s or Dr. Suzanne’s?’ asked Francine.

  ‘I know,’ cut in Max. ‘Emma Tremayne’s.’

  Francine shifted in her chair and Will saw her abdomen ripple as the baby thrust out a foot or a fist or some tiny part of its body. He got a funny feeling in his mouth; a kind of tingling. Weird…

  ‘Who is this Emma?’ inquired Francine. ‘I didn’t know she was in the team.’

  ‘She isn’t,’ he declared.

  ‘Emma is their new PR lady,’ explained Max. ‘And what a PR lady…’ He sighed. ‘Long dark hair, curves in all the right places, lovely voice. Hasn’t she, Will?’

  ‘Max…’

  His eyes glittered in triumph. ‘I’ve got eyes, mate. I saw what you were like at the Wordsworth Center—like a stag in the rutting season.’

  ‘Thanks, mate. Attractive image.’ Yet he had to admit, Max was right. That’s exactly what he did feel like when Emma was within fifty feet.

  ‘Is this Emma on your hit-list?’ said Francine, making Will conclude she wasn’t as blameless as she looked.

  ‘Definitely not. She’s just been drafted into helping us with the fund-raising. It’s only Max that seems to think I’ve got a crush on her. He’s wrong. I haven’t,’ he said, draining the last of his wine from his glass.

  ‘Really?’ said Max, sounding unconvinced. ‘A gorgeous woman asks you to get your kit off for her and you object? You must be losing your grip, Will. Until a few months ago I thought you never refused a request like that from a single woman.’

  ‘Max—you make me sound a complete bastard. Sorry, Francine,’ he apologized.

  ‘To be fair, you do have quite a track record with the ladies,’ went on Max easily. ‘What about that blonde nurse or the girl with the mile-long legs and her own four-by-four dealership? And that posh one? An Honourable, wasn’t she? At least she was until she met you.’ He laughed at his own joke, leaving Will fuming inwardly behind a mask of good humor.

  Will turned to Francine, planting a kiss on her cheek. ‘There’s only one woman I’m interested in right now. The one who’s going to have my goddaughter or godson very soon. How long now, sweetheart?’

  ‘Five weeks,’ she groaned. ‘But I do hope he or she will put in an appearance sooner than that. Would you like some more wine?’ she said, indicating the empty bottle.

  ‘Love to. But sit down. I’ll get it. I know Max’s wine cellar better than he does by now. Red or white?’

  ‘There’s already a bottle of Meursault in the fridge. The corkscrew’s in the kitchen drawer. Nothing for me, thanks.’

  He was halfway out of the door before he heard Max call after him, ‘There was no mistaking your reaction to her at the Wordsworth Center. What other woman could get you soaking wet without needing rescuing? Mind you, she didn’t look too thrilled to see you—you looked like you’d already had a lover’s tiff to me.’

  ‘Things aren’t always what they appear, Max. You should know that by now.’

  In the safety of the kitchen, Will pulled the cork from the wine bottle, his mind working overtime on how to distract his hosts from any jibes about Emma, the calendar, or his love life.

  Condensation oozed down the side of the bottle as the straw-colored liquid swished into the glass with a satisfying glug.

  His fingers closed around the stem.

  If only he were about to share this nice glass of chilled wine with Emma on the sofa at his cottage. She’d arrive, fresh from work, in that suit and he’d show her into the drawing room. Imagine, he thought, her slim little fingers caressing the bowl of the glass. Her full lips sipping the wine as she tucked an unruly strand of mahogany hair behind her ear. Her fiery green eyes regarding him, not with contempt, but with desire, as she made it clear she wanted him every bit as much as he wanted her.

  He would take the glass from her hand and place it slowly and deliberately on the coffee table. Then, just as slowly and deliberately, she would slip her jacket off her shoulders, unzip her skirt, and ease it over her hips. Naturally, in his fantasy, she wouldn’t have a blouse on—just a black half-cup bra which she would unhook before releasing her full breasts. Or maybe even that camisole.

  Black thigh highs too, of course. Oh yes—sheer, sexy stockings and her most impractical heels. He felt himself grow hard at the thought of her removing that lot.

  As for the rest, there would be—not a lot. Nothing at all, when he’d finished with her. A silky thong perhaps or a pair of lacy mini-shorts stretched tight across the peachy curve of her bottom. Whatever, he would take them off and toss them carelessly aside, just to let her know she wouldn’t be needing them for the rest of the evening.

  She’d be naked then and the tiny down on her honey-colored skin would rise under his fingertips as he traced a path with his tongue around her taut nipples, over her gently curving belly and between her thighs.

  He wonde
red if, for their first time, they’d make love on the rug in front of the hearth or with her pressed over the slippery chintz of the chaise longue in the drawing room. He would definitely have to have her in his four-poster at least once. That went without saying

  Damn!

  Cold wine was running down his fingers and pooling around the base of the wine glass. Grabbing a cloth from the sink, he tried to mop the counter as the puddle expanded and began dripping over the edge of the granite worktop. He’d just poured a good part of a bottle of Max’s best Meursault on to the kitchen floor!

  Hastily, he wiped the tiles with a paper towel and filled two more glasses. Shoving the nearly empty bottle into the fridge, he hoped his friend would soon be too mellow to notice.

  Right, that was it. He was going back into the dining room to enjoy the rest of his dinner and to forget all about Emma Tremayne but, even as he crossed the hall, the realization dealt him a body blow.

  Forget Emma? Just who the hell was he trying to fool? He had to bring back the focus to his life: concentrate on his business, push through his plans for the outdoor center, maybe even fit in some climbing. All the things that should demand his attention, that he’d once enjoyed—correction, still enjoyed—doing.

  Chapter 7

  ‘Oh come on, Emma. It’ll do you good. You’ve had a face like a wet weekend for ages now.’

  ‘It’s kind of you, Jan, but…’

  ‘Kind?’ Jan almost snorted with derision as she plonked herself down on Emma’s desk. Emma looked down at her notepad. She’d doodled endless mountains and ridges all over the page. She wondered if it was Freudian.

  A hand, tipped with long red nails, was slapped down over the page.

  ‘Don’t be so daft,’ scolded Jan. ‘I don’t ask people out for an evening out of sympathy. I ask them because I like them. It’ll do you good to get a few glasses of red down you… I won’t take no for an answer.’

  Two weeks had gone by since the encounter at the office. Two weeks in which she’d tried hard to wipe Will out of her mind and forget what she’d let him do to her. Emma thought she’d been doing well. She didn’t think of him more than a few times a day now and certainly didn’t get his photograph out more than once a night. She didn’t try and recall the feel of the touch of his lips on hers more than a few times. Not at all today…

  She smiled at Jan. ‘OK, then, sounds like I don’t have much choice.’

  With the proofs approved and the calendar moving on to the printers’ stage, she’d had absolutely no reason to visit the rescue base. The marketing team at Echo GPS was putting her sponsorship proposals to the board and things were looking promising.

  Although she’d tried hard, she couldn’t think of a single excuse for staying in on a Saturday night—and Jan really wouldn’t take no for an answer.

  ***

  Emma and Jan were sitting with their drinks in the Black Dog, a traditional Lakeland pub with a hole-in-the-wall hearth, flagged floor, and ceilings to bash your head on—especially if you were six feet three. Emma heard Will Tennant’s expletive from her seat in the tiny, packed bar before she saw him.

  She groaned inwardly and felt her stomach give an annoying little flip. Now, wasn’t that just typical? In London, you could go a lifetime without ever seeing a stranger twice but in her few short months up here, she’d learned you were lucky if you got as far as the postbox without saying hello to at least three people you knew by sight and half-a-dozen you’d never met before in your life.

  Being sociable to complete strangers, she had to admit, was one of Bannerdale’s strong points.

  Not tonight.

  Tonight, Emma thought as she heard a grunt from the pub door, living in a village with a smaller population than the Rogue PR building, was a pain in the bottom.

  ‘Sorry,’ exclaimed Will to no one in particular, as he rubbed his head ruefully after banging it on the low beam inside the porch of the Black Dog. He straightened up as he walked into the bar, followed by some of the other rescue team members. Emma caught Suzanne’s eye and waved at her. Jason, the red-haired builder, blushed.

  Will didn’t seem to have noticed her and he certainly didn’t look as if he’d lost any sleep over her. In fact, he looked dangerously attractive as ever in his battered jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt. There he was now, tall and confident, and already ordering a round of drinks. And he was not alone—oh no. Even above the hubbub of the crowded pub, Emma couldn’t fail to hear the shriek.

  ‘Will! Darling!’

  ‘Oh. Hello again, Tara.’

  She saw a young woman, barely more than a girl really, in the tightest cropped top and trousers she had ever seen, launch herself on him like an overexcited puppy. Will brushed his lips across her cheek and the teenager wound her arms round his neck like a lovesick boa constrictor.

  Emma met his eyes over the girl’s shoulder. All her resolve to stay cool and indifferent evaporated. You pig, she thought, a girl old enough to be—well, not quite Will’s daughter, but almost. But even she had to admit he didn’t look too thrilled with the situation himself. Good grief though, the girl had her talons in his backside now. She could see him trying to pull them away but the remorseless Tara only grabbed him again. Serves him damn well right, thought Emma with disgust.

  ‘Who’s that girl?’ she hissed.

  Jan put her wine glass down long enough to take in the tightly clad figure shrink-wrapped around Will’s powerful frame.

  ‘Oh… that’s the youngest McKinnon sister. Mummy and Daddy own a couple of swanky hotels on the lake. It looks like young Tara’s got her claws into your friend Will—literally. I’d have thought she was a bit of a baby, even for him. But maybe that won’t bother Casanova.’ She held up her glass. ‘Anyway, it’s your round, Emma, and I’ll have dry white and soda this time.’

  Moving to the bar, Emma was still cursing the village’s shortage of salubrious pubs. Why tonight? she asked herself. Why did he have to walk in here? Still, she told herself, just because he was in the same bar didn’t mean she had to speak to him.

  However, she also knew that ignoring Will wasn’t going to prove that simple. Her only strategy was to join the queue at the bar, keeping as much distance as she could between herself and Will and Tara. She was still close enough to hear them, though.

  ‘Will, aren’t you going to buy me a drink, darling?’ squealed Tara, swaying on her vertiginous heels.

  ‘I’ll get you an orange juice. If you take your hands away from my backside.’

  ‘But it’s such a lovely one,’ she slurred, squeezing harder. ‘And I don’t want orange juice. I want a proper drink with vodka in it.’

  ‘I really think you’ve had enough already, pet.’

  ‘Don’t be so boring,’ she replied petulantly. But Emma saw Tara swap her grip for a stranglehold round his neck. Saw his grimace too, as he replied, ‘Boring or not, that’s all you’re getting from me, Tara.’

  ‘Two orange juices please, Dave,’ Will called to the barman. ‘And whatever the lady at the end of the bar is having.’

  ‘Which lady would that be, sir?’

  ‘The cracking one with long dark hair trying not to look in my direction right now.’

  ‘Ah that one, sir.’ The barman came over to her and enquired, ‘What’ll it be, madam? The gentleman is paying.’

  The cracking one with long dark hair. Hmmm. Very smooth. Too late, she realized she should have answered sooner, because Will was now doing it for her.

  ‘She’d probably like champagne… but as this is Lakeland, a pint of Bluebird.’

  ‘No! I don’t drink pints!’

  ‘White wine spritzer, then, madam?’

  ‘Yes please… I mean no!’

  Dave had already turned his back and started pouring the wine. Tara snatched her arms from Will’s neck in disgust and stormed off to the ladies’.

  Emma was mortified at falling into Will’s trap. His arrogance infuriated her. He obviously thought it was funny to act like h
e owned the place… and her—and she’d fallen for it, hook, line, and sinker. She glanced across at him angrily.

  He wasn’t smiling now. He looked serious and handed her the drink.

  Emma took the wine glass as if it were a poisoned chalice, ordered Jan’s wine and soda, and went back to her seat without thanking Will. She saw him shrug his shoulders and return to his friends in the corner of the bar, watching her from a safe distance. When she reached their table, Jan wasn’t there. She spotted her through the old arch into the pub lounge, chatting away nineteen-to-the-dozen with Pete Harrison, the photographer from the photo shoot.

  So it had come to this, reflected Emma, here she was at last: drinking Chardonnay alone in a bar with Will Tennant a few feet away, throwing a too-casual glance in her direction every few minutes in a way that made her feel like a suspect under surveillance.

  She decided that as soon as she’d finished her poisoned chalice, she was going to call a taxi and leave. She’d barely taken a sip when the space next to her was filled by a friendly face.

  ‘Hi, Emma.’

  Emma felt relieved and smiled. ‘Hi, Suzanne.’

  ‘Haven’t seen you for a bit,’ said Suzanne, putting her glass of Coke on the table. ‘What have you been up to?’

  ‘Oh, you know, just busy. You know how it is. I’ve been busy tying up a sponsorship deal for the calendar.’

  ‘That sounds promising.’

  Nodding vigorously, Emma crossed her fingers. ‘I hope so. If it comes off, it should swell the funds a lot.’

  ‘We’ve missed you at the base.’

  ‘I don’t have any real reason to visit now… the calendar’s at the printers.’

  ‘You don’t need a reason to come down to see us. You’re almost an honorary member now,’ said Suzanne grinning. ‘Especially after your adventures at the rappelling.’

  She pulled a face.

  ‘It’s not because of Will, is it?’

  Emma tried to hide her discomfort with a smile. ‘What has Will got to do with anything?’