Rumor Has It (39 page)

    'OK, I'm going to level with you. I was in the hotel this evening getting ready to come here and really,
really
looking forward to meeting you. Then all of a sudden it hit me.' Parker shook his head and said wryly, 'I wondered how you'd be feeling about meeting me, and real ized you'd probably be scared witless.' He paused. 'Was I right?'

    'Well, maybe. Maybe not scared
witless
,' said Kaye. 'Call it… wary.'

    'Now you're just being polite. As you would have been tonight, on the surface. But let's face it, I could have been a complete psycho path. I still might be, for all you know.'

    'You're not.' Kaye's confidence was absolute.

    'I know I'm not.' He smiled. 'But you don't. And the fact that I bid five thousand pounds to have dinner with you has to be a worry. Anyhow, that's why I suddenly decided I couldn't see you. I couldn't bear the thought of you sitting opposite me, wishing you could be anywhere else, and hating every minute. The money didn't matter. I just wanted to let you off the hook, because anything would be better than knowing you were fright ened of me.'

    'I'm not frightened anymore,' said Kaye. 'I promise.'

    'Glad to hear it. And thanks for not letting me cancel.' He relaxed visibly in his chair. 'It's really good to meet you.'

    'Very nice to meet you too.' Kaye couldn't begin to describe the

way she was feeling about this gentle, sensitive man; all she knew was that he was someone she would trust with her life.

    'We're being watched,' said Parker.

    'I know. Sorry about that.'

    'Your security team. We could invite them to join us if you want. The waiters would rearrange the tables if we ask nicely, so we're all sitting together.'

    'No thanks, they're fine where they are.' Kaye didn't want Max and Lou constantly interrupting, asking questions, spoiling the evening. 'I can't tell you how much I love that painting you sent, by the way. It's hanging up in my living room. So kind of you to think of me.'

    'My pleasure. You'd been through a rotten time. Trial by tabloid. I just wanted to cheer you up,' said Parker.

    'You shouldn't have spent that much.'

    He shrugged. 'Money isn't too much of an issue. As you may have gathered. Anyway, I'm glad you're enjoying the painting.'

    He had the nicest eyes, warm and sparkly and crinkling at the corners each time he smiled. Kaye, who didn't make a habit of asking impertinent questions, said, 'How'd you get so rich?' Well, she wanted to know. Googling Parker's name hadn't come up with anything helpful. She really hoped he'd earned his money rather than inherited it.

    'I'm an architect. Not very exciting, but we have a successful prac tice. P. K. Price, over on Hudson Street.' Taking out his wallet, he removed a business card. 'Residential, corporate, big buildings, small buildings, anything you like. Just say the word and we'll design it.'

    'And nobody minded you taking time off work to come over here?'

    'Mind? They were delighted to be rid of me. No, it was fine. I've just finished a big project so I was due a break.'

    He seemed so normal, yet what he'd done definitely came under the heading of unusual. Kaye said bluntly, 'How much would you have bid up to, at the auction?' God, she couldn't believe she was coming out with these questions.

    And the best thing was, he was answering them.

    'Twenty thousand. Dollars,' he added hastily as her eyes widened. 'Ten thousand pounds, that was what I told the old guy over the phone. Which was pretty nerve-wracking, but I had to give him some kind of limit. No offence, but I couldn't risk him getting back to me, saying he'd had to go up to half a million to get you.'

    'I'm definitely not worth half a million.' Kaye shook her head. 'I can't believe you thought I was worth ten grand.' She looked at him, completely unafraid now, and said, 'Why am I? Why did you come all this way?'

    The waitress had brought them their menus ten minutes ago and they hadn't even looked at them yet. Parker said steadily, 'I can't tell you why. It'd sound…' He stopped, shook his head. 'No, sorry, I can't tell you why.'

    Kaye liked it that he couldn't tell her. He wasn't exactly blush ing, but he looked as if he might be on the verge of it. Spotting the waitress hovering at a discreet distance, she said, 'We're holding up the kitchen. Let's decide what we're going to eat. Are you hungry?'

    'Not really.' His smile was wry.

    Kaye's eyes danced. 'Nor me.'

'LOOK AT THEM.' IT was ten thirty and Max was getting fed up. 'They haven't stopped yakking all night. Bloody hell, he's getting his money's worth, isn't he?'

    'Dad, calm down. He paid a
lot
.'

    'But it's late, and you have to go to school in the morning.'

    'I know,' said Lou, 'but it's only double geography first thing. Everyone sleeps through that.'

'Here comes the cavalry,' said Parker. 'Riding to your rescue. Looks like my time's up.'

    Glancing at her watch, Kaye couldn't believe it was eleven o'clock. And here came Max, determinedly heading across the almost deserted restaurant. 'It's OK, I'll deal with him.'

    'Hi there. Good evening. We have to go now,' Max said without preamble.

    'That's fine. You go. I'm going to stay on for a bit longer.'

    'No no no.' He shook his head. 'You can't do that.'

    'Yes I can.' Kaye signaled with her eyes that everything was fine. 'We're having a lovely evening and I don't want to leave yet. I'll catch a taxi home when I'm ready.'

    'No you
won't
,' said Max, 'because we arranged to come here and keep an eye on you, and leaving you on your own with a stranger who could be a complete
freak
—no offense—would be a crazy thing to do.'

    'But that was before we met him. And Parker isn't a freak, so you don't have to worry any more!'

    Parker raised a hand. 'Hey, it's OK. He's right. We've had a great evening, but now we should call it a night.'

    Kaye felt like a teenager being picked up early from the disco by her dad. She heaved a sigh and said to Max, 'Just give us two minutes.'

    'Fine. Two minutes.' Max shot her an are-you-mad? look in return. 'No more.'

    As soon as he was out of earshot, Kaye said, 'Sorry about my ex-husband. Tact was never his strong point.'

    'He's looking out for you. That's a good thing.'

    She gazed at Parker, whose features were becoming more won derfully familiar by the minute. They'd talked about their child hoods, holidays, old school friends, embarrassing experiences, food dislikes, bizarre Christmas presents received, favorite films, and least favorite chat-up lines, darting endlessly from one subject to the next because there was simply so much to say. And still so very much to learn. Was this how it felt when you met your soul mate?

    Without even stopping to think about it, Kaye blurted out, 'So anyway, are we seeing each other again?'

    Parker's whole face lit up. 'Are you just being polite?'

    'No, not at all.'

    He relaxed visibly. 'I'd love that.'

    'Tomorrow night?'

    'Hmm.' Smiling, Parker pretended to reach into his jacket pocket. 'I'll have to check my diary, see if I'm free.'

'At bloody last,' said Max when Parker left the restaurant and Kaye joined them at the bar. 'Job done. Let's go. I thought we'd have been out of here by ten o'clock.'

'What was he like?' Tilly was curious.

    Kaye could feel herself glowing. 'Really, really nice.' How could she begin to explain the way she was feeling without making them think she was off her rocker? Then again, who cared what they thought? 'In fact, he still is nice. I'm seeing him again tomor row night.'

    'Over my dead body,' snorted Max.

    'OK.' Pointing two fingers at him, she fired. 'Bang, you're dead.'

    'That's what you'll be when he does it to you. Jesus Christ, don't you get it?' Max was incredulous. 'You have no idea who this man is. All you know is that he's sent you stuff, practically stalked you, and paid a crazy amount of money to cross the Atlantic and have dinner with you. So tell me, how normal does that sound, eh?'

    Kaye shrugged. 'I'm still meeting up with him tomorrow night. You don't have to tag along.'

    'Of course I do! Somebody has to! Bloody hell, I don't believe this is
happening
,' bellowed Max.

    Me neither, Kaye thought joyfully, but it is.

    
Isn't it great?

There were some things you really didn't expect to see on your way to work at seven forty-five on a Thursday morning, and Jack Lucas holding a wailing half-naked baby at arm's length was one of them.

    Tilly, having pulled into the filling station for petrol, queued behind a white van and observed the goings-on with a mixture of emotions. Jack's car was parked at one of the pumps and a red Fiat stood with its doors flung open in the valeting bay. A toddler was screaming in his car seat, his harassed mother attempting to calm him with a juice box. That task completed, she turned her attention back to the younger baby, peeling the sodden white onesie carefully down over its frantically kicking legs so as not to splash baby sick over Jack's polo shirt. Mission finally accomplished, she dropped the onesie into a carrier bag. The nappy-clad baby, still being held under the arms by Jack, promptly threw up again, missing Jack's jeans by a whisker. Handing it over to the mother, he went over to his car and reemerged with a pack of tissues which the woman gratefully took from him.

    The white van drove off. Tilly moved up and began filling her car with petrol. Further along the row of pumps, Jack was now doing the same. Having mopped clean her bawling infant and stuffed it back into its babyseat, the mother effusively thanked Jack—her knight in shining armor—before driving off.

    Tilly was torn. Half of her acknowledged that he'd done a good thing. The other half simmered with frustration because it was genu inely beyond her how he could be so thoughtful one minute and so selfish the next.

    Nodding across at her, Jack called out cheerily, 'Morning!'

    'Morning.' Conflicting emotions continued to tussle inside Tilly's chest. In his sand-colored polo shirt, faded Levi's, and desert boots he was looking… God, pretty damn fit. His dark hair glistened in the morning sunlight, and as he handled the fuel nozzle, she could see the way the muscles moved beneath the gleaming tanned skin of his forearm. Put it this way, if you were to make a YouTube clip of Jack filling his car with petrol, you'd want to watch it over and over again. Physically he was perfect. Which only made the other side of him that much more of a letdown.

    'See my narrow escape back there with the incredible puking baby?'

    Oh, for crying out loud, was he deliberately goading her now? 'Yes I did. What a complete hero you are. Then again, who's to say it wasn't one of yours anyway?'

    'Actually it wasn't.' He sounded amused. 'I'd never seen the woman before in my life.'

    'Oh well then, you can cross her off your list. But have you even been in touch with Amy yet?'

Jack's smile faded. 'No.'

The look of utter disinterest on his face said it all.

    'So you'll go out of your way to be nice to the baby of a complete stranger, but you couldn't care less about one that could be your own flesh and blood.' Tilly's tank was full of petrol now and she clunked the nozzle noisily back into its holster. 'Don't you see how cruel that is? I just don't know how you can live with yourself.'

    Jack shook his head; now she'd really annoyed him. Well, good. Someone had to say it.

    'OK, let me just tell you something. The reason I haven't spoken to Amy is because I'm not the father of that baby of hers.'

    'But—'

    'And I know that for a fact because I haven't slept with her.'

    Tilly stopped dead. What?
What?

    Was he serious?

    She looked at Jack. 'You mean… you haven't
had sex
with her?'

    The older woman at the next pump was listening avidly.

    'That's another way of putting it,' said Jack.

    'What,
never
?'

    'Never.'

    'But… but, she said you had!'

    He shrugged, turned away.

    Tilly was incredulous. 'Why would she say that if it wasn't true?'

    'Who knows?' bawled the man in the Volvo behind her. 'Bloody women, law unto themselves, they drive us all bloody nuts. And you're another one.' He jabbed an irate finger at Tilly. 'Standing there, yakking away without a care in the world while the rest of us sit here in the queue waiting for you to SHIFT YOUR BLOODY CAR!'

    Eek. Tilly glanced round and saw that he was right. Blushing, she hopped into the car and moved it over to one of the parking spaces. Back at the pumps, Jack was hanging up his nozzle and twist ing the petrol cap back into place. Tilly headed on into the station shop to pay for her petrol, expecting him to follow her so she could continue the interrogation. Ten seconds later, through the window, she saw his Jag disappearing up the road.

    Tilly let out a squeak of surprise, prompting the cashier to raise an eyebrow and look up.

    'Someone just drove off without paying,' Tilly bleated.

    The cashier looked bored. 'That's because they were in the Express lane, love. You put your credit card in before you start.'