Reluctant Date (3 page)

If she finished work early she would just have enough time
to go home, throw jeans and a sweater into a bag, and catch the six o’clock
train.

Happier now she had something to look forward to instead of
mooning around all weekend pretending Daniel Marchant hadn’t happened, she
checked the time.
 
As she did so the
double doors burst open and a class of solemn seven-year-olds came in followed
by a harassed teacher and two classroom aides.

Claire smiled at them and told them to pile their coats and
hats onto one of the reading benches well away from the busier part of the
library. Then she led them through to the children’s section. For the next hour
she answered questions and talked about books.
 
Not until she finished reading the final page of the story she had
chosen did she remember a leaflet that had arrived with the morning’s post.

“Who likes poetry?” she asked.

Twenty-four hands shot into the air.

“Good, because I’ve the very thing for all of you. A poetry
competition!
 
I’ll photocopy the details
for your teacher while you collect your belongings.”

She was smiling as she led them back into the main library,
a smile that faded into a look of total disbelief when she saw Daniel Marchant
standing there. Something about the way he was leaning against the counter told
her he had been waiting for quite sometime.

“Hello,” his eyes had golden flecks that she didn’t
remember. He didn’t smile.

“I…I…what are you doing here?”
 

“Looking for you. It’s taken me quite a while to track you
down.”

He didn’t look tired now, and without the shadows under his
eyes he was even more attractive than the first time she met him. Something
inside her that might have been her heart, shifted slightly. She pulled herself
together. She was at work and Daniel Marchant wasn’t interested in dating. He
had made that very clear when they met.

“Just let me finish what I’m doing and then I’ll take an
early lunch break,” she said. Then she ignored the knowing looks that her
colleagues gave her and did her best to concentrate on photocopying the poetry
leaflet.

* * *

Ten minutes later she and Daniel were hurrying across the
road to the local sandwich shop, their heads down against a sudden squall of
rain.
 
Claire pushed open the door and
Daniel followed her inside.

“This wasn’t quite what I had in mind,” he said with a wry
nod towards the huge chalkboard that listed the day’s sandwich fillings.

“Sorry, but I’ve arranged to have a short lunch break today
so I can leave at four o’clock. I’m going to visit my parents,” she added as
she studied the chalkboard and wondered why she didn’t feel hungry.

Once they had collected their order she grabbed a table well
away from the door so they wouldn’t be interrupted by the steady flow of people
who were ordering food to take out.
 

“Why are you here?” she said.
 
It came out more forcefully than she intended
because she didn’t for one moment think Daniel Marchant was a stalker.
 
Nor was he a weirdo, or an eccentric, or any
of the other things she had learned to avoid when she arranged her dates.

He held up his hands in silent apology for his unannounced
intrusion into her working day.
 
“I’ve
come to offer you a job,” he said.

Whatever Claire had expected, it wasn’t that.
 
She stared at him in disbelief.

He smiled at her bemused expression.
 
“You did say you were in a rut and maybe a
solution was to change your job,” he reminded her.

She nodded. While half of her was intrigued by the prospect
of something so unexpected happening to her, the other half felt deflated.
 
So he hadn’t come searching because he wanted
another date. No! It was because he had a job vacancy and she fitted.
 
Remembering how skillfully he had uncovered
all the details of her life as they chatted over their shared meal, something
sharp twisted in her heart. Daniel Marchant had been interviewing her. He
wasn’t interested in her personally at all.

“Don’t you want to know what it is?” he asked.

“I suppose so,” she knew she sounded grudging but it was
difficult not to when her head was warring with her heart, and her heart was
winning.

“I run a small company involved in coastal research and I
need someone to photograph and catalogue the results of the work we are doing.”

Claire’s eyes widened.
 
“It sounds interesting but why me?”

“Because you have the right qualifications and, unless my
memory has failed me, a keen interest in wildlife. You also told me you thought
travelling or a new job might be what you needed.
 
If you decide to take the job, you can do
both.”

“Well yes, but...did you say travelling?”

“Mmm,” Daniel spoke around a mouthful of sandwich.
 
He swallowed it. “The job is in Florida.”

Claire stared at him. She was lost for words.
 
Florida!
 
A dream job in Florida, and all she could think of was that Florida was
a long way away and she didn’t know anything about him. The jumble of thoughts
loosened her tongue.

“Your profile said you work in tourism.”

“I do,” he pushed the plate of sandwiches towards her. “As
well as my research company I manage a holiday property development business.
It’s a family concern started by my father. My real interest is ecology though.
Eventually I want to develop some eco friendly properties where people can
spend a few days close to nature and learn all about the world we live in.”

“But I don’t know anything about you, or your companies,”
she protested. She wished her parents had passed on the ‘try anything once’
gene that had coloured her childhood.
 
She knew her mother would already be packing by now, far too excited by
the prospect of an adventure to worry about the disruption to her life.
 
Claire, however, remembered the anxiety of
being uprooted and sent to yet another school in another town only too well.
Even after all this time her stomach still churned and she still felt sick when
faced with a new situation. She stared at Daniel, panic building.

He pulled a couple of business cards from his pocket and
handed them to her. Both had website addresses. Then he pushed back his chair
and stood up.

“Look I know it’s too much for you to take in right away, so
how about I leave you to think about it.
 
Check out the websites.
 
One is
for the family business and it will tell you everything you want to know about me.
 
Call the company if you want to.
 
Ask anything you like. You don’t need to
worry that Carl will answer because he doesn’t work there,” he gave her an
unapologetic grin.

“The other one is for my own research company.
 
You’ll be able to see what it has achieved so
far and what the plans are for the future. That way you’ll have your questions
ready when I collect you from work at four o’clock.
 
I’ll drive you to your parent’s house so we
can discuss it on the way.”

“But my parents live miles away,” she protested, standing up
as well.

“I know where they live Claire. You told me on Monday,” he
reminded her.
 
“It’s not a problem.
 
What is a problem, however, is the fact that
I have to be back in the States by Monday evening so we don’t have much time to
tie this up. Now are you going to eat your sandwiches or not?”

“Not,” she said. She didn’t know whether to be excited by
his offer or to be angry at the way he was trying to organize her life.

“In that case I’ll have them,” he said, scooping them up. He
bit into the first one as he made for the door.

Claire sat down again and remained at the table for another
ten minutes, her coffee growing cold.
 
She knew why Daniel Marchant thought she would be prepared to give up
her life and her friends and travel to Florida, because she had already told
him.
 
She had said she was in a rut and
needed a change at the same time she told him she didn’t want a husband or even
a date.
 
As far as he was concerned she
was a safe bet in a world where his family seemed determined to marry him
off.
 
She would never be a threat to his
self-imposed bachelorhood.
 

She drew in a long breath as she remembered his height and
the width of his shoulders under his well-cut gray suit. Then she remembered
his long, lean thigh muscles as he stretched his legs out under the table. She
pulled on her coat with a sigh.
 
If only
he knew!
 

Chapter Three

True to his promise, Daniel was waiting for her outside the
library when she left work at four o’clock.
 
He was at the wheel of a black sedan that was parked half-on and
half-off the sidewalk.
 
Claire got in
hurriedly as a traffic warden approached.

Daniel grinned at her, switching on the ignition as he did
so. “Just in time!
 
Which way now?”

“I need to go home to collect some clothes,” she told him as
she directed him down the nearest side street.
 
“Then we need to beat the rush hour.”

“Fine.
 
I’ll drop you
off and go and find a gas station.
 
Will
twenty minutes be okay? ”

She nodded; relieved he didn’t expect her to invite him into
her apartment.
 
Although she had learned
quite a lot about him from a quick trawl of the company websites before she
left work, she wasn’t about to let her guard down. She had every intention of
keeping her distance while she considered his job offer. However tempting it
sounded, she would still tell him she needed the weekend to think about it.

* * *

Half an hour later they were aiming for the motorway.
 
The traffic was too busy for serious
conversation so they kept it to pleasantries while Daniel negotiated his way out
of the city. Once on the open road, however, he filled her in on the details of
the job he had in mind.

“The company has only been operating for a little over three
years.
 
At the moment we are
concentrating on coastal habitats and the effect of climate change on migrating
birds and marine life. Later on we’re going to research terrestrial animals
too.
 
It’s still a fairly small affair
but thanks to a skeleton staff and lots of volunteers, it’s beginning to
influence coastal and wetlands conservation. It’s doing good work, but slowly.
I want to speed it up by employing someone who can catalogue the research and
photograph some of the results. That’s where you come in.
 
With your experience you could set up some
educational programs too.”

Claire looked at him.
 
It was dark now but she could see his profile, the way he was
concentrating on the road ahead.
 
He
glanced across at her. Their eyes met for a fleeting moment before he returned
his gaze to the rain-spattered windscreen.
 
It was enough, though, for Claire’s heart to start pumping double
time.
 

She couldn’t do this.
 
She knew she was being ridiculous, knew she should grasp the opportunity
he was offering her with both hands, but she couldn’t do it.
 
It was bad enough that her stomach was
already churning at the thought of moving somewhere new without the added
complication of Daniel Marchant.

The memory of what it felt like to have her heart broken was
still with her even though it was years since she’d been betrayed. When she was
twenty she had fallen in love with an older man and started dreaming of the
life they would have together. For a long time he had seemed to want the same
thing, so when he left her for someone else she’d been utterly devastated.
Unwilling to accept his rejection she’d made a fool of herself, pleading with
him to give their relationship another chance.
 
She had abandoned all pride; sure that he would soon realize his
mistake. Nothing in her life had prepared her for the pain of having her heart
thrown back in her face.
 

Five years on, although the hurt had gone, the memory of his
betrayal still coloured her attitude to relationships. It was the main reason
she was still footloose and fancy free because the experience had persuaded her
it was better to stick to uncomplicated friendships.
 
Until now she had only indulged in
relationships that left her heart intact and her emotions untroubled.
 

This attitude had got her to the here and now without too
many problems, but she knew Daniel Marchant was a different matter.
 
Tall, tanned, and sun-bleached, he was the
shadowy figure who roved through her barely acknowledged dreams. He even shared
her interests. There was only one problem. He was so not interested in her
except as an employee, that she could feel her heart breaking all over again as
they drove along the dark ribbon of motorway.

“I’m sorry but…I don’t…I can’t do it,” she said and her
voice was unexpectedly shaky.

* * *

Despite Daniel’s best efforts she hadn’t changed her mind by
the time he pulled into the overgrown driveway of her parent’s house.