Happily Ever After...: His Reluctant Cinderella / His Very Convenient Bride / A Deal to Mend Their Marriage. Sophie Pembroke

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       CHAPTER EIGHT

      ‘YOU LOOK...’ RAFF CAME to a nonplussed stop, trying to find a word, any word, that did Clara justice. It didn’t exist.

      ‘Beautiful?’ Clara supplied for him. That wasn’t the word; it wasn’t enough by any measure. ‘I hope so. I’ve spent all day being prodded, plucked and anointed. If I don’t look halfway decent at this exact moment in time then there is no hope.’

      ‘Don’t worry,’ he assured her. ‘You’re somewhere past halfway.’

      The truth was that at the sight of her all the breath whooshed out of his body; in a room full of glitter she shone the brightest. In the end she had eschewed all the designer dresses Rafferty’s had to offer and had opted for a vintage dress that had belonged to her great-grandmother, a ballerina-length full-skirted black silk with a deceptively demure neckline, although it plunged more daringly at the back, exposing a deep vee of creamy skin.

      Raff immediately vowed that nobody else would dance with Clara that evening, no other man would be able to put his hand on that bare back, feel the silk of her skin.

      ‘You scrub up nicely as well,’ she assured him.

      Raff pulled at his bow tie. He’d owned a tux since his teens but he still felt as if he were dressing up as James Bond.

      Or a waiter.

      ‘Nervous?’

      ‘A little,’ he admitted. ‘Not about the presentation, more how Grandfather will take it. How is he?’

      ‘He’s here.’ She pulled an expressive face. Her relationship with Raff’s grandfather had thawed a little; he was at least polite. But although she told Raff—and herself—that his initial rebuff didn’t worry her, she wasn’t being entirely honest. It was all too reminiscent of Archibald Drewe’s treatment of her, an uneasy and constant reminder of her mistakes.

      ‘Grumpy that he has a special diet and can only drink water but happy he’s away from that damned TV and fool nurse. His words not mine.’

      ‘I bet he’s glad to be talking work as well.’ Raff had mingled business with business and invited some of Rafferty’s key suppliers and associates to fill the table he had paid for. It was odd seeing his two very different worlds colliding in this rarefied atmosphere of luxury and wealth.

      Opting for something a little unusual, Doctors Everywhere were holding the event in a private garden belonging to the privileged residents of a west London square.

      ‘It’s amazing, like a fairy tale.’ Clara was looking out at the candlelit gardens, her green eyes shining. Watching the lights play on her hair and face, Raff could only agree.

      ‘We have some very generous—and very rich—patrons,’ he said, trying to drag his thoughts back to the business at hand. ‘I hadn’t even thought about this side of our work. I spend the money, not raise it. I need to talk to Grandfather about allowing them to use Rafferty’s for something in the future. We could certainly donate food and staff or raffle prizes.’

      And the people he knew could give even more. Helping with the last stages of the fundraiser had been an eye-opener, just not a particularly welcome one.

      Raff knew he did a good job out in the field, but anyone with a good grasp of electrics, mechanics and project management could do that. He had other uses that were far more unique: entrée into some of England’s richest and most influential echelons and, although he himself didn’t value those connections, he knew that no charity could run on good intentions alone. Ensuring the donations came in was a vital role.

      But would it be as satisfying? Or would it be a gilded cage just like the one he was working so hard to escape from?

      ‘Is everything set up?’ Clara was as cool and collected as ever, on the surface at least, but when he took her arm he felt the telltale tremble.

      ‘Ready to go,’ he promised her. ‘My mission tonight is to get all these people to remember why they’re here and part with as much money as possible.’

      And throw the gauntlet down. Show his grandfather that this was where he belonged—and this was where he was staying, no matter what. Only he didn’t feel the same burning need to get back out into the field. It helped, of course, that he had been helping to set up the fundraiser, interacting with colleagues, seeing a new side of the charity’s work. But it was more than that.

      Clara. Everything he didn’t want or need in his life. She needed stability and commitment and a father for her daughter, not a travelling jack of all trades whose idea of a perfect day with family meant a day by himself. And yet, and yet...

      Somehow she had got under his skin. More than attraction, more than lust. He respected her, admired her strength—but it was those glimpses of carefully hidden vulnerability that really hooked him in. He knew how much she hid it, despised any display of weakness. But she had trusted him enough to lean on him, cry on him, allow him to shoulder her burdens for a short time.

      From Clara that was a rare and precious gift. But was he worthy? And was he capable of accepting all that she had to offer?

      * * *

      ‘They certainly do a lot of good.’ Raff’s grandfather had been slowly softening throughout the evening, his initial scepticism disappearing when he saw his table companions and the carefully prepared meal that had been specially provided for him. If he still cast a longing look or two at the bottles of very expensive wine that littered the table, he had at least stopped complaining and was sipping the despised mineral water with martyred compliance.

      ‘I had no idea about the sheer scale of their work,’ Clara agreed. ‘Nor just how desperate things can be. I’ll never complain about waiting for a doctor’s appointment again.’

      Raff and his colleagues spent their lives making sure that people all over the globe, people who lived in poverty, who had fled their homes, who had seen their world turned into warzones still had access to medicine, to doctors. To hope.

      He could have taken the easy option, the job provided for him, СКАЧАТЬ