Nancy Warren - British Bad Boys

“Rachel, wait,” he said, before she’d taken more than a step. “I want to see you again.”

Her heart leapt. Oh, thank God. “I’d like that,” she said.

“Why don’t you come up to London?” He slipped into a clean shirt. “I’ll take you to dinner and the theatre.”

She sighed in pure bliss. “Sounds good.”

“All right. I’ll give you a ring. Have you got a mobile?”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s a California number.” And she reeled off her cell phone number. He pulled out his and programmed her into memory. Cool.

“I could make you breakfast,” she said, suddenly not wanting him to go.

He shook his head, buckling the belt on his trousers. “No time. The M5 will be murder if I don’t get away soon.”

She felt very unhappy with the M5. But Jack wanted to see her again. That was something.

“I never gave you a menu for your sister’s wedding,” she said, suddenly feeling like the worst caterer in the British Isles.

“Believe me, anything you make will be brilliant. You’re a genius with food.”

He came over and kissed her soundly, then grabbed his bag, which she now saw was neatly and completely packed, slipped into his shoes, and left.

It was six o’clock in the morning, and she was the only person awake in Hart House.

She didn’t feel like sleeping, but she didn’t feel like hanging around here, either.

She made sure any trace of her was gone, including tucking in all the blankets and remaking the bed so it looked like only one side of the bed had been used. Satisfied, she crept out of the door and stealthily made her way back to her own room, where she changed out of Maxine’s clothes once more, showered, and hauled on her usual jeans and a favorite black cotton shirt.

She let her hair hang free and put on a little makeup. Nothing like a night of great sex to put a person in a good mood, she thought as she realized she was feeling better than she’d felt for months.

So the restaurant had closed, so she’d failed at marriage. Her life wasn’t over. She was young, talented, attractive enough that a man like Jack Flynt could spend the night making love and paying extravagant compliments to her.

Life was good.

Feeling grateful to Maxine and George for putting up with her for the past few miserable weeks, she decided to surprise them with breakfast.

Max, annoyingly, was right. She’d needed to get back to cooking. Now she couldn’t seem to stop. Something simple, she decided. An omelet with fresh herbs from the garden.

Rachel told herself repeatedly that she wouldn’t expect Jack to call. Wouldn’t expect anything. Just because he’d said he wanted to see her again did not mean that he was obsessively going over every detail of their night together the way she was, or even that he did in fact want to see her again.

Phrases like that should come with subtitles, as in a foreign movie. “I’d like to see you again,” he’d say. Translation: I’m really not that into you. Don’t expect more. “I’ll call you,” meaning You’ll never hear from me again. “We’ll have to do this again sometime.” I’ve already forgotten your name.

It didn’t matter. Hadn’t she hooked up with him exactly with a casual affair in mind? All she wanted was some uncomplicated fun. A chance to prove to herself and her battered ego that she was still a contender.

So even as she rolled her eyes and scoffed when Max made some comment about how well she and Jack had hit it off, she felt warm all over.

And if she carried her cell phone with her everywhere, never let it out of her sight for a second, no one had to know why.

Somehow she’d fallen into the business of the estate. Well, with Max for a sister, it was impossible not to. The woman was so full of energy and plans for raising revenue-a surprising number of which seemed to include food, and therefore Rachel’s input-that she kept busy. Too busy to mope and feel sorry for herself. Even better, she was appreciated. George had appeared horrified at first to find Rachel was the chief caterer on the estate, but she hazarded a shrewd guess that Max had informed him that work would be good for her poor, depressed sister, because he never argued again. What he did was thank her, repeatedly and sincerely, for all her help.

It had been a long time since anyone had taken the time to thank her.

And he did it so charmingly. If his charm was inherited, no wonder his family had managed to thrive through centuries of turbulent history. Her sister, she had to admit, had chosen herself a great guy. How nice to know they were still out there.

Max had hinted that she and George weren’t getting married until Hart House was operating in the black. How could she not want her sister to be happy? So she cooked, she catered, she sourced local suppliers, she planned.

She was in the old stables with Maxine, working out details of a corporate retreat for a big computer manufacturer who wanted to put on a medieval fair, including jousting. Her job was to create a menu of authentic medieval food, then figure out how to feed it to three hundred workers who’d no doubt be exhausted from jousting, fencing, archery, barging on the river, and learning to party like it was 1399.

“It’s going to be simple fare, obviously,” she said to Max. “Back then, they’d roast whatever animals they’d raised or hunted, eat local produce. No potatoes, obviously, since they hadn’t discovered America yet. Honey for sweetening, I imagine. I wonder what spices were imported then? I’ll check.” She was scribbling notes to herself when her cell phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Jack Flynt here.” He had a business voice on, she noted. “Did I ring you at a good time?”

Since he sounded so businesslike, and she was so happy to hear from him, she felt flirtatious. Turning away from Max, she took a few steps toward the open door, hoping her nosy sib would assume she was searching out better reception. “It depends what you have in mind,” she said.

A short pause. “Naturally, I rang you to make lewd, filthy suggestions.”

“Then you picked the perfect time,” she said.

He laughed. “I may not say them”-he dropped his voice-“since I’m about to go into a meeting with the Italian trade commissioner, but I’m definitely thinking them.”

“Me, too,” she admitted.

“Can you come up to town on Saturday? We’ll poke around and I’ll take you to dinner.”

He’d called. And when he’d said he wanted to see her again, he’d actually meant he wanted to see her again. She wanted to throw her phone in the air and scream with excitement. “Yes, I’d love it.”

“Great. Bring your toothbrush. I’ll drive you back down on Sunday.”

“A whole weekend? That sounds serious.”

“Once I get you naked, my sweet, I’ll show you serious.” He raised his voice. “Yes, I’ll be right there,” and then a few phrases in Italian. “Sorry, I’ve got to go.”

“Ciao.”

She turned to find Max standing much closer than was even remotely polite. “Was that Jack?”

“You have no subtlety whatsoever, do you?”

“Too many years in television. Well?”

Rachel nodded, wondering if she looked as pleased with herself as she felt. “He’s invited me up to London for the weekend.”

“Oh, my God. I knew it. You slept with him, didn’t you?”

She nodded, unable to stop the smile that bloomed.

“And?”

“It was fantastic.”

“Best ever?”

The grin widened. “No contest. I swear, one more orgasm would have killed me.” She sighed, already thinking ahead. “A whole weekend.”

Max’s delight dimmed a notch and a worried frown creased her forehead. “You know his reputation, don’t you?”