A Special Kind of Woman. Caroline Anderson
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I’ve just bumped into a friend and decided to come back,’ he said, and then wondered if it were rather overstating the case to call her a friend. Probably. A slight acquaintance was nearer the mark.
Very slight.
And yet he felt he knew her, because they were sharing the same very real and basic emotions at the moment and that gave them an instant connection.
He ushered her to a seat, his hand resting lightly on the smooth, supple curve of her spine, and as they sat down opposite each other she flashed him a small but potent smile that hit him right in the solar plexus.
‘Thank you for rescuing me,’ she said softly. ‘I hate coming into places like this alone, but I couldn’t go on any longer without…’
She trailed off, so he finished the sentence for her. ‘Letting go?’ he suggested. His grin felt crooked. ‘Been there, done that.’
Cait searched his face with her luminous grey eyes, and he wondered if the few renegade tears that had escaped his rigid control had left their mark. So what if they had? he decided. He loved his son. After all they’d been through together, Josh was worthy of his tears.
‘Are you OK?’ she asked gently, and he gave a soft grunt of laughter.
‘I’ll do,’ he said with a sigh, and she smiled back, tucking her long dark hair behind her ears and fiddling with her watchstrap.
‘Hell, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘I’ve spent years working towards this with her, and now it’s come I feel—oh, I don’t know what I feel.’
‘Oh, I do,’ he said with heartfelt sympathy. ‘I know exactly how you feel.’
Her smile was a bit wonky. ‘Oh, well. At least you didn’t make an ass of yourself in the car park,’ she told him drily, and he chuckled.
‘I wouldn’t bet on it.’
The waiter came up to them, pad in hand, and asked if they were ready to order.
‘Coffee?’ Owen suggested, and she nodded.
‘Please.’
‘Anything else? We could always eat if you’re hungry.’
He met her eyes, those lovely soft grey eyes with the dark line defining the iris. Her skin was clear, her lips soft and mobile, and he had an insane urge to kiss them. Just now they were moving, saying something, and he had to pull himself together almost physically. ‘Sorry, I didn’t catch that,’ he said, and she gave him an odd look.
Dear me, you’re losing it, Owen, old chum, he told himself, and felt heat crawl up his neck.
‘I said, I don’t want to hold you up,’ Cait repeated. ‘Won’t your wife be waiting for you?’
Jill. His embarrassment faded, replaced by the ache of an old, familiar sadness.
He shook his head. ‘No. No, she won’t be waiting,’ he said softly. ‘What about you? Will there be someone waiting for you?’
She shook her head. Something flickered briefly in her eyes that found an echo in his lonely soul. It was replaced by her slightly off-kilter smile. ‘No. No one’s waiting for me, except the cat, and she can cope.’
‘So—how about it?’
‘I tell you what, I’ll bring your coffee while you decide,’ the waiter said, giving up on them and handing them a menu each. Owen felt a twinge of guilt. He’d forgotten the man’s existence.
‘Thanks,’ he murmured, and raised a brow at Cait. ‘Well?’
She looked down at the menu, then up at him again. ‘Um—if you’ve got time, I wouldn’t mind something light.’
‘Have whatever. I’m going for a truly wicked fry-up.’
Her eyes widened, and then she laughed, a low, musical sound that played hell with his composure. ‘Comfort food?’ she said wryly, and he chuckled.
‘Something like that. Plus I don’t have Josh nagging me. He’s a health-food freak. How he’ll survive in halls I can’t imagine.’
‘Milly will be in clover. My cooking’s hit and miss at the best of times, and most of the time I’m too busy to worry. I can’t remember when I last cooked anything like a roast—well, apart from last night, but it was sort of the Last Supper and the Prodigal Son all rolled into one, if you get my drift.’
He did. He’d done just the same thing, only they’d gone out to a restaurant and then on to a pub and caught a taxi home, both a little the worse for wear and a bit subdued this morning.
The waiter brought their coffee, and Owen poured them both a cup and sat back, stirring his cream in absently and thinking about Josh and how odd it was going to be at home without him.
‘So, what do you do that keeps you so busy?’ he asked with deliberate cheer, changing the subject, and she laughed and rolled her eyes.
‘I’ve got a shop, for my sins—I hire and make ball gowns, and occasionally wedding dresses. It’s a bit seasonal, but there’s usually a steady flow of work. The balls are winter and the weddings are summer, in the main, so it pans out quite well. What about you?’
‘I’m a doctor—a surgeon,’ he told her. ‘I cut up people instead of fabric. It’s easier than your job. People heal.’
It made Cait laugh. ‘True, but I can buy new fabric if I make a mess, and I can always make a mock-up,’ she pointed out, and he smiled.
‘I’ll have to concede that one. I can’t see me waking a patient up and saying, “OK, that was just a dummy run, now we’ll do the real thing.”’
Her smile was gorgeous. Too wide, really, but her teeth were even and sparkling, and her nose wrinkled up when she laughed. She really used the whole of her face. Every muscle of it was involved in her spontaneous expressions.
She’d be a lousy poker player, Owen thought slowly, but she’d be incredible to make love to. Every touch, every stroke would find an echo in that wonderfully mobile face and those incredible eyes.
He shifted slightly in his seat, aware of the stirrings of a need he hadn’t felt in years. She worried her bottom lip with her teeth, and his breath jammed in his lungs. He dragged his eyes from her face and down to the menu, scanning it blindly for a moment until his eyes focused. Then he chose the most wicked thing he could find and stuck the menu back in the holder.
‘I’m ready when you are,’ he told her, his voice sounding strangled, and the double meaning hit him like a tram. Oh, hell. He hoped she wasn’t looking at him, because for a brief, terrifying second he was sure his thoughts were clearly written on his face—and they were seriously, seriously X-rated!
Cait was starving.
Owen had chosen what he was having and had put his menu down, but she was torn between the toast and pâté she’d spotted at first and the wonderful illustration of golden crispy chicken and chips with a side salad. It was horribly expensive by comparison, but what the heck. She could afford to splash out every once in a while, and it was a rather unique occasion, if not exactly special in the accepted sense!
‘I can’t decide,’ she murmured, but her eyes strayed back to the chicken and chips. ‘I was going to have the pâté, but this looks so tempting…’
‘Go for it,’ he advised, taking the menu out of her hand. ‘Stop worrying. Instinct is a wonderful thing.’
‘So it is. OK, I’ll go for it.’
She looked up into his face, but it was expressionless, apart from a polite smile that told her nothing. He hailed the waiter, ordered their meal and topped up her coffee.
She stirred the cream into it, chasing a bubble round the top, and then looked up at him again, surprising an unguarded look that made her breath catch in her throat.