‘I’ll call you.’
‘Great,’ he said, his attention already fading and his gaze involuntarily sliding back to the dance floor, more specifically to the woman in the middle of it who was now beginning to move.
‘Would you like to dance?’
‘I’m afraid I don’t.’
‘I see,’ said Anna? Hannah? Susanna? with a faint smile. ‘You’re the type that likes to watch.’
And it seemed he was, because despite his best efforts to the contrary he couldn’t take his eyes off Abby. At first she seemed to be messing around, dancing as cheesily as the music, but then something slower came on and her moves gentled, became less frenetic, more languid, more sinuous. Jake twirled her and dipped her, tried—and alarmingly pleasingly failed—to pull her in close, and the longer he watched, the more transfixed Leo became.
It was odd, he thought, his pulse beating unnaturally fast. It wasn’t as if she were the most beautiful woman he’d ever met, so why was he so aware of her? Why did he find her so arresting? So compelling? Why did he want to leap to his feet, shove Jake aside and take over?
None of it made any sense, and because it didn’t he didn’t like it one little bit. It meant he didn’t know what was happening and therefore wasn’t in control, which was a situation he hadn’t experienced for years and had taken great care to avoid.
But Abby was a situation he couldn’t avoid because unfortunately, later, he was going to have to seek her out.
When Jake had asked him before dinner if what had happened up there in his flat was going to be a problem he hadn’t needed to expand. They were both well aware that their reputation was a fragile thing. Not all their developments were popular and their opponents would use anything they could lay their hands on to influence planning decisions. As his brother was always saying, the integrity of the company—and the two of them—was of utmost importance, and if anything called it into question serious damage could be done.
And while Leo might be the numbers man who preferred to stay in the background and leave all the publicity stuff to his brother, the business and its success meant everything to him. He hadn’t spent years building it up only to have it potentially destroyed by one moment of lunacy, so if Abby had a problem with what had happened earlier he’d fix it. The sooner the better. He really had no choice.
To that end, he ought to be figuring out a strategy, not watching his brother maul Abby and grinding his teeth. Somewhere else, because here he was barely able to think straight, let alone strategise, so, with a muttered excuse and a tight smile to the planning officer whose name he couldn’t remember, Leo got to his feet.
He shot Abby one last quick glance, which was a mistake because for one split second she returned it, and he nearly crashed into a table. Taking the feeling that he’d been thumped in the solar plexus and then bashed over the head as pretty much par for the course this evening, Leo set his jaw and made for the exit.
* * *
Alone in the vast conference room that had doubled up as the venue for tonight’s celebrations, Abby flopped onto a chair, eased her heels off with a grimace and flexed her toes. God, that felt good. Her shoes were about as comfortable as shoes could get, but after six hours on her feet and then a quarter of an hour on that dance floor she could quite happily do with never setting eyes on the damn things ever again.
Crossing one leg over the other and massaging one of her soles, she glanced round the dimly lit room, now cleared of the festive decorations that had festooned the place, the crockery, the cutlery, the glassware and the tablecloths, and, in contrast to the noisy buzz of earlier, eerily silent.
Tomorrow the tables would go, the dance floor would be dismantled and the room once again div
ided into three, but just for five minutes, before she turned off the one remaining light and left, she could reminisce and indulge in the satisfaction of a job well done.
All in all, tonight had been quite a night, she thought with a smile as her mind drifted over the events of the evening. The food, the drink and the entertainment had all gone off with the minimum of hitches, the guests had had a great time and Jake had been pleased. As far as she knew no one had photocopied their bottom and the stationery cupboard hadn’t been commandeered for inappropriate usage.
Of course, with the attention to detail and the meticulous planning she always lavished on every event she organised, she’d have expected nothing less than perfection, and the subcontractors she worked with, most of whom she’d known for years and were the best, knew that. But still. Tonight had been good.
Which was particularly pleasing because this was the first event she’d organised for the Cartwright brothers and she was hoping it wouldn’t be the last. Clients like these—who were big, influential, and willing to give her the perfect combination of a generous budget, few requirements and total control—weren’t all that common and she wouldn’t mind hanging onto them.
She certainly hadn’t minded hanging onto Jake when she’d locked gazes with Leo back there on the dance floor and her knees had practically given way, she thought as the giant glitter ball moved a fraction, caught the light and took her back to the moment in question.
It hadn’t been so much the look on his face that had rocked her, because that had been as neutral as ever, but it was the sensation that he’d been watching her. Intently. And for a while. That had made her feel all weirdly flustered inside and if Jake hadn’t been there to catch her when she stumbled she’d have ignominiously hit the deck.
Leo had disappeared by the time they’d come off the dance floor, thank goodness. So had the brunette, although she didn’t want to think about that particular coincidence. Switching into work mode a lot later than she should have done, Abby had legged it to the kitchens and from then on had focused on what she was there to do.
She hadn’t seen Leo again, and it occurred to her now that the prospect of doing so in the future was highly unlikely. The night was over and even if she did get more work here she’d likely liaise with the relevant department. The only reason she’d had direct contact with Jake about this evening was because he held the admirable and rare view that if he handled things—even if it simply meant hiring her—then it was a party for everyone, not everyone bar the person who had to organise it.
And it was totally fine. Better that way, actually, because Leo Cartwright, whether in her league or out of it, had made her feel all kinds of things she’d really rather not, none of them remotely professional. Plus, he made her think with her body instead of her head, and that was unusual enough to be deeply unsettling, so all in all if she never saw him again, it would be for the best. In fact—
‘Here you are.’
At the sound of the deep voice behind her Abby gasped and jumped, and swivelled round to find the man himself standing in the doorway, leaning one shoulder against the frame, his hands in his pockets, his eyes dark and his expression inscrutable as he looked down at her.
She blinked, just in case tiredness had caught up with her and she’d started hallucinating, but no. He was still there. Looking tired and dishevelled with his bow tie hanging untied around his neck and the top couple of buttons of his shirt undone, but nevertheless so devastatingly handsome that she went all hot and tingly while her stomach did a weird kind of swoop.
‘Goodness, you gave me a fright,’ she said, clapping a hand to her chest as if that might sort out her suddenly erratic breathing.