Heidi Rice - Misbehaving Under the Mistletoe - On the First Night of Christmas... / Secrets of the Rich & Famous / Truth-Or-Date.com

Cassie’s fumbling explanation ground to a halt as Nessa sucked her teeth in derision.

‘What?’ Cassie said. ‘Why do you look so fierce?’

‘Right this second, I’m visualising what I’d like to do to that little cheater’s nuts. This is all his fault,’ Nessa snarled, sounding as fierce as she looked.

Cassie sighed. ‘It’s not his fault. Not any more. I got over him months ago.’ The truth was it had been remarkably easy to let go of Lance. Once she’d kicked him out of her life it had become distressingly obvious that they had never been that good together. What had been much harder to let go had been all the romantic dreams she’d had of having a settled secure life with a man who loved her. Something her mother had never managed. Cassie had picked Lance for the male lead in her Happy Ever After plan because he’d been convenient and available and had seemed to want the same thing. She’d never looked beneath the surface of their relationship. Had taken the tepid attraction she felt for him, and the yearning to have a real commitment from a man who wouldn’t break his promises, and turned their relationship in her mind into something it had never actually been.

‘This goes further back than that,’ Cassie admitted. ‘Lance was just the trigger to make me realise something I’ve been refusing to admit to myself for years.’

‘What’s that?’ Nessa said, clearly not getting Cassie’s rambling explanation. Not all that surprising as she was only just starting to understand it herself.

‘Remember how I always fell for my dad’s lies too, Ness? Remember how excited I’d be when he said he was taking me to the zoo, or the cinema? I’d build all my hopes up, convinced this time would be different. And then I’d be devastated when he didn’t show.’

‘It isn’t your fault your daddy was a tool too.’

‘And David?’ Cassie said. ‘Remember him? The love of my life in art college who turned out not to be all that interested in me? Can’t you see there’s a pattern here? That has as much to do with me as them?’

‘What pattern?’

‘I’ve always been so gullible. So easily fooled by even the slightest show of affection. It’s pathetic.’

Reaching across the coffee table, Nessa covered the hands Cassie had clenched in her lap. ‘You’re not gullible. You’re sweet natured and optimistic. It’s not a crime to always think the best of people.’

Cassie met her friend’s steady, reassuring gaze. ‘It is if you always end up letting yourself get hurt … I just don’t want to tempt fate with a guy like Jace Ryan.’

‘Damn.’ Nessa shook her head. ‘That is a shame, when he’s so good in bed.’

Cassie sent her friend a weak smile. ‘He’s too good in bed. How can I guarantee I won’t start getting more than just sexually attracted to him? I’ll overdose on really amazing sex. And before you know it I’ll be concocting yet another stupid fantasy that’s going to end up biting me on the backside.’

Nessa threw up her hands, looking exasperated. ‘Now wait a minute. Who says this couldn’t lead to more? Stranger things have happened. Look at me and Terrence. We plain out hated each other at school and now we’re engaged to be married.’

Nessa and Terrence hadn’t hated each other at all; they’d just been in denial about their attraction for years. Something all their friends had figured out long before they had.

‘Now who’s the hopeless romantic?’ Cassie arched her eyebrow. ‘Quite apart from the fact Jace lives in another country.’ She hesitated—or at least she had assumed he did, it was one of the many things they hadn’t discussed during their all-night sex-fest. ‘We’re not talking about Terrence. We’re talking about Jace the Ace. Do you have any idea how many girlfriends he got through at school? Because I do. He was my first major crush.’ In fact he’d been her only crush. Once he’d been kicked out of school, she’d never got so obsessed again, because no one else had ever been able to live up to his perfection in her teenage eyes. ‘Every other week, he’d have a new girlfriend hanging on his arm.’ And every other week she’d gone through the torments of hell, as only a thirteen-year-old could, because that girl hadn’t been her.

What a complete twit she’d been about men. Even then.

Nessa cradled her mug in her palms, scowling slightly. ‘All right, I’ll admit he may not be long-haul material. He certainly wasn’t at school. But people change.’

‘He hasn’t,’ Cassie mumbled, remembering the ‘have I slept with you?’ remark.

‘Maybe. Maybe not. But one thing I do remember,’ Nessa countered. ‘He was always real careful not to be doing more than one girl at once. He was never a cheater,’ she finished pointedly.

‘Great!’ Cassie puffed out a breath. ‘So he’s a serial monogamist. So what? He’s still far too dangerous a man for me to get involved with at the moment. I’m through having my dreams trampled on … and I’ve got to take some of the responsibility for that. I’ve got to be proactive from now on, and make sure I only have realistic dreams.’

‘Realistic dreams!’ Nessa scoffed. ‘Where’s the fun in that? That sounds more boring than one of my Aunt Chantelle’s Bible-study classes.’

‘The fun is,’ Cassie said mildly, ‘with realistic dreams, you might actually have some hope of them coming true.’

THE loud buzz of the doorbell cut through the hum of the radio. Cassie’s hand jerked and the newly reconstructed Sugar Plum took it on the nose again.

‘Oh, for Pete’s sake!’ She glared at the white card, the intricate design of gossamer wings, willowy body and delicate features ruined a second time.

It had been two hours since Nessa had left and Cassie had set to work recreating her original drawing. After her chat with her best friend, her nerves had finally stopped jitterbugging enough for her to pick up her pen without risking another mishap. And to be honest she had to get this design done today. It was the twenty-first of December tomorrow. She had to get the cards printed this afternoon or she’d risk not getting them in the post in time for Christmas. Something she’d never failed to do before.

The doorbell buzzed longer and louder. Dumping the pen and picking up her washcloth, she marched to her front door. She had lots of friends and neighbours who often popped round to see her unannounced, but this was ridiculous. She’d put a sign on the door after Nessa left so she could draw in peace for the rest of the afternoon, and also because she’d wanted a bit of time to contemplate the revelations she’d finally discovered about herself in the last twenty-four hours.

Her body would always regret having to turn Jace down, and it would have been wonderful to indulge herself over Christmas, but she was coming to terms with the fact that she’d done the right thing. Now all she had to do was persuade her hormones. And the best way to do that was to stop thinking about what she’d left behind in The Chesterton hotel suite this morning and start concentrating on her Christmas card design. Unfortunately her friends were not playing along.

Slipping the deadbolt lose, she wrenched open the door.

‘Can’t you read, you …?’ Her hormones sprang into a brand new jitterbug as her gaze landed on the tall man standing on her doorstep with his hand braced against the door jamb and his pure green eyes glittering with annoyance.

‘Jace? What are you doing here?’ she whispered, her breath backing up in her lungs.

He straightened. ‘What the hell do you think I’m doing here?’ He marched past her into the flat, instantly making her tiny living room shrink to shoe-box size.