It Started With... Collection. Miranda Lee

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ suddenly, the thought of having some gorgeous guy’s arms around her again was quite pleasurable. More than pleasurable, actually. Almost a necessity.

      Her female hormones, it seemed, had finally been jump-started again.

      Her sigh carried a measure of frustration. And irritation. It was something she could do without. Men complicated things. They always did.

      Useless creatures, all of them.

      Except in that one department!

      Now that her hormones were hopping again, she had to admit there was nothing to compare with the pleasure of being with a man who was a good lover.

      Emily’s father had been pretty good in bed. But he’d also been a feckless, reckless fool whose wildly adventurous spirit had finally been the death of him, snowboarding his stupid way off a mountain and into a crevasse even before Jessie had discovered she was having his baby.

      Jessie had finally come to realise at the wise old age of twenty-eight that the members of the opposite sex who were good in bed were rarely good at commitment. Usually, they were charming scoundrels. She suspected that even if Lyall had lived, he would not have stuck by her and his baby.

      No, she was better off without men in her life, in any capacity. For now, anyway. Emily was still only four and very impressionable. The last thing she needed was for her mummy to start dating guys who were only interested in one thing. There was no future in that. And no happiness.

      Men could indulge in no-strings sex without suffering any lasting emotional damage. Women, not so easily.

      Jessie had taken a long time to get over Lyall, both his death and the discovery she’d made afterwards that she hadn’t been the only girl in his life.

      ‘What I really want for Christmas more than anything,’ she said firmly as she packed her make-up essentials into her black evening bag, ‘is a decent job in an advertising agency.’

      Jessie had worked as a graphic artist before she’d fallen pregnant, with an eye to eventually being promoted to the position of creative designer. She hadn’t wanted to spend the rest of her life bringing other people’s ideas to life; or having them take the credit when she improved on their designs. Jessie knew she had considerable creative talent and dreamt of heading her own advertising team one day; being up close and personal when the presentations were made; getting the accolades herself—plus the bonuses—when she secured a prestigious account for Jackson & Phelps.

      That was the advertising agency she’d worked for back then. One of Sydney’s biggest and best.

      Having Emily, however, had rearranged her priorities in life. She had planned on going back to Jackson & Phelps after her maternity leave was up. But when the time came, she’d found she didn’t want to put her baby daughter into day-care. She wanted to stay home and take care of Emily herself.

      She’d thought she could work from home, freelance. She had her own computer and all the right software. But a downturn in the economy had meant that advertising budgets were cut and lots of graphic artists were out of work. Freelance work became a pipedream.

      Jessie had been forced to temporarily receive state benefits, and to move from the trendy little flat she’d been renting. Luckily, she found accommodation with Dora, a very nice lady with a very nice home in Roseville, a leafy northern Sydney suburb on the train line.

      Dora had had a granny flat built on the back when her mother—now deceased—had come to live with her. It was only one-bedroomed, but it had its own bathroom and a spacious kitchen-cum-living room which opened out into the large and secure back yard. Just the thing for a single mum with an active toddler. Emily had turned one by then and was already walking.

      The rent Dora charged Jessie was also very reasonable, in exchange for which Jessie helped Dora with the heavy housework and the garden.

      But money was still tight. There was never much left over each fortnight. Treats were a rarity. Presents were always cheap little things, both on birthdays and at Christmas. Last Christmas hadn’t been a big problem. Emily hadn’t been old enough at three to understand that all her gifts had come from a bargain-basement store.

      But Jessie had realised at the time that by this coming Christmas, Emily would be far more knowing.

      As much as Jessie had enjoyed being a full-time mother at home, the necessities of life demanded that she get off welfare and go back to work. So last January, Jessie had enrolled Emily in a nearby day-care centre and started looking for a job.

      Unfortunately, not with great success in her chosen field.

      Despite her having her name down at several employment agencies and going for countless interviews, no one in advertising, it seemed, wanted to hire a graphic artist who was a single mum and who had been out of the workforce for over three years.

      For a while, earlier this year, she’d done a simply awful—though lucrative—job, working for a private investigator. The ad in the paper had said it was for the position of receptionist. No experience required, just good presentation and a nice phone voice. When she’d got there, she was told the receptionist job had been taken, and she was offered investigative work instead.

      Basically, she was sent out as a decoy to entrap men who were suspected by their partners of being unfaithful. She’d be given the time and place—always a pub or a bar—plus a short biography and photo of the target. Her job had required her to dress sexily, make contact, then flirt enough for the target to show his true colours. Once she’d gathered sufficient evidence via the sleek, hi-tech mobile phone which the PI supplied—its video recording was excellent—Jessie would use the excuse of going to the powder room, then disappear.

      It had only taken Jessie half a dozen such encounters before she quit. Maybe if, just once, one target had resisted her charms and shown himself to be an honourable man, she might have continued. But no! Each time, the sleazebag—and brother, they were all sleazebags!—wasted no time in not only chatting her up but also propositioning her in no uncertain terms. Each time she’d dashed for the ladies’, feeling decidedly dirty.

      After that low-life experience, she’d happily taken a waitressing job at a local restaurant. Because of Emily, however, Jessie refused to work at night or at the weekends, when the tips might have been better, so her take-home pay wasn’t great. On top of that, her expenses had gone up. Even with her government subsidy for being a single parent, having Emily in day-care five days a week was not cheap.

      The only bonus was that Emily adored going to her pre-school. Jessie sometimes felt jealous over how much her daughter loved the teachers there, and the other kids. She’d grown up so much during this past year.

      Too much.

      She was now four, going on fourteen.

      Last weekend, she’d begun asking questions about her father. And had not been impressed when her mother tried to skirt around the subject. A flustered Jessie had been pinned down and forced to tell Emily the truth. That her daddy had died in a tragic accident before she was born. And no, her mummy and her daddy had not been married at the time.

      ‘So you and Daddy aren’t divorced,’ she’d stunned Jessie by saying. ‘He’s not ever coming back, like Joel’s daddy came back.’

      Joel was Emily’s best friend at pre-school.

      ‘No, СКАЧАТЬ