One Wedding Required!. Sharon Kendrick

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СКАЧАТЬ Finn had known best, because Amber had grown to love the decor he had picked out. As in so many other areas of her life, he had been her guide and her mentor. ‘So I moved in.’

      The journalist licked his lips. ‘And he joined you?’

      Amber shook her head and laughed. ‘Oh, no! I couldn’t have imagined Finn living there! He had a much grander apartment overlooking Hyde Park.’

      The journalist looked around him. ‘That’s this apartment?’

      Amber nodded. ‘Uh-huh—and eventually I moved in here. With him. But that’s how it all started.’

      The journalist swallowed down another mouthful of wine. ‘So it was like—a red-hot romance straight away?’

      ‘Certainly not!’ Amber’s mouth pursed into a prim little line. ‘I worked for Finn for two years before he even laid a finger on me.’ Until she had grown to want him so much that she’d thought she would die with the wanting. And had convinced herself that a man like that wouldn’t look twice at a working-class girl from the council estate. But in that she had been completely wrong. A smile played around the lush curves of her mouth. ‘He played Pygmalion instead.’

      ‘And how did he do that?’ asked the journalist casually.

      ‘Oh, he sent me to a make-up artist and a hairdresser. Then I had my colours done by a colour therapist, and after that I saw a stylist and she advised me about what kind of clothes to wear.’

      ‘She advised you pretty well,’ murmured the journalist, running his eyes over the gold silk-knitted tunic dress she wore, which showed off the best pair of legs he had ever seen.

      ‘Well, Finn certainly thinks so,’ said Amber, an unmistakable note of reproof in her voice which told the journalist in no uncertain terms to back off.

      ‘Er, yes. Finn.’ Averting his eyes from the milky-white stockings which made her legs sheen so provocatively, the journalist took another sip of his champagne instead. ‘He’s doing pretty well for himself.’

      Amber nodded. Sometimes she thought he was doing a little too well. The business was booming—and so successful that Finn rarely seemed to have time to draw breath just lately. Even acquiring a partner hadn’t helped, not really—even though Jackson Geering was a faultless choice. In fact, maybe Jackson was just too good.

      He had been taken on by Finn to ease some of the workload at Allure—but such was Jackson’s talent for the business that he had succeeded in drumming up a whole load of new openings! He was currently in New York, looking into the possibility of opening a branch of Allure over there. Amber knew that Finn was excited by the prospect and she was worried. How far did a man have to drive himself before he could accept his own success?

      But, while she might suggest that he was in danger of overdosing on stress, she couldn’t tell a man of nearly thirty-four how to live his life...

      She sneaked a quick glance at her watch. It was getting on for five o’clock. And once Paul Millington had left she would be free to start cooking, which she loved so much that Finn often teased her about it. She liked to prepare robust food—full of vegetables and pulses. Hearty, healthy, economical meals, and, even though Finn told her time and time again that they were rich enough to eat caviare non-stop if they wanted to, some part of her loved concocting the simple meals which had been a part of both their childhoods.

      The journalist saw her looking at her watch, recognising that she wanted to end the interview. Good. When the subject was impatient for him to leave, that was when they were often at their most indiscreet. And indiscretions made the best stories, no doubt about it...

      ‘So how did Finn propose?’

      Amber laughed and shook her head, the thick hair swaying as fluidly as golden syrup. ‘Oh, no—I’m not falling for that one! He’d kill me if I told you!’

      ‘In bed, then?’ he quizzed mischievously.

      Amber blushed like a thousand sunrises, and then could have kicked herself. ‘I’m not saying!’

      Actually, they hadn’t been in bed at the time. They had been closeted in a sumptuous downstairs bathroom at a weekend house party which neither of them had really wanted to attend, hosted by the owner of one of the country’s best-selling glossy magazines.

      Finn rarely did anything he didn’t want to do, and he didn’t like socialising much. For a start, he didn’t get the time. And when he did he liked to live a simple life, far away from the glamour of the industry in which he worked. But even Finn had been able to see the sense of attending such a party.

      ‘Shall we go?’ he had queried casually one morning as they had been driving in to work together.

      ‘Do we have to go?’ Amber had asked.

      She still felt shy in the company of huge gatherings of strangers—probably because most people were captivated by Finn. He was the one they wanted to talk to, not her. For all her blue-eyed, golden-haired beauty, people still gravitated to the dark man with the streetwise eyes by her side. Sometimes, Amber felt like a dim satellite next to Finn’s bright, blazing planet.

      Finn shook his head. ‘We don’t have to do anything, sweetheart—but it might be fun.’

      ‘Fun?’

      ‘Mmm. Show you the sort of life we could be living.’

      As an exercise in comparison, it proved invaluable, showing Amber—if she had needed showing—that the glossy high life was not for her.

      She was forced to put up with beautiful women flirting outrageously with Finn all evening, acting for all the world as though he had not brought a woman with him.

      He saw her resigned expression across the table as she picked at her smoked salmon, and attracted her attention without too much trouble, leaning across the table to talk to her.

      ‘What’s up?’ he quizzed softly.

      Amber shrugged. ‘Nothing.’

      ‘Something,’ he contradicted. ‘Is it the other women?’

      She gave him a rueful smile. ‘It goes with the territory, Finn—you’re an extremely attractive man, and they just can’t seem to stop themselves!’

      ‘No,’ he agreed thoughtfully, his dark lashes framing the emerald brightness of his eyes. ‘But maybe you think I encourage them?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Even subconsciously?’

      She shook her head. ‘You don’t need to have legions of women fawning over you in order to boost your self-esteem—your ego is healthy enough without that!’ But maybe she ought to make more of an effort to enjoy herself in a similar way. ‘Go back to your fan club, Finn Fitzgerald,’ she told him softly. ‘I’m fine.’

      She forced herself to chat to the man on her right—a wunderkind film director who, she soon discovered, had an irreverent sense of humour. Even though she was aware of the beauty busy pouting beside Finn, the wunderkind managed to keep her halfway entertained all the way through the impressive array of different courses. She was just unwrapping another chocolate mint when she glanced up СКАЧАТЬ