After Hours.... Christy McKellenЧитать онлайн книгу.

       CHAPTER FOUR

      IF SOMEONE HAD asked Max to explain exactly what had prompted him to suggest that Cara move in, he was pretty sure he’d have been stumped for an answer.

      All he knew was that he couldn’t let things go on the way they were. Judging by her outburst, she was clearly struggling to cope with all that life had thrown at her recently and it was no skin off his nose to let her stay for a few nights in one of the empty bedrooms.

      He had enough of them, after all.

      Also, as a good friend of her cousin’s he felt a responsibility to make sure that Cara was okay whilst Poppy was away and unable to help her herself. He knew from experience that good friends were essential when life decided to throw its twisted cruelty your way, and he was acutely aware that it was the support and encouragement of his friends that had helped him find his way out of the darkness after Jemima died.

      Watching Cara working hard the next day, he was glad she was still around. When she was on good form, she was an asset to the business and, truthfully, it had become comforting for him to have another person around—it stopped him from thinking so much in the resounding silence of the house.

      They hadn’t talked about what had happened again, which was a relief. He just wanted everything to get back to the way it had been with the minimum of fuss. With that in mind, he was a little concerned about what it would be like having her around at the weekend. He’d probably end up working, like he always did, so he wasn’t too worried about the daytime, but they’d need to make sure they gave each other enough space in the evenings so they didn’t end up biting each other’s heads off again.

      With any luck, she’d be out a lot of the time anyway, flat-hunting or seeing friends.

      At six o’clock he leant back in his chair and stretched his arms above his head, working the kinks out of his tight muscles.

      ‘Time to finish for the day, Cara,’ he said to the side of her head.

      She glanced round at him, the expression in her eyes far away, as if she was in the middle of a thought.

      ‘Um, okay. I’ll just finish this.’ She tapped on her keyboard for a few more seconds before closing the laptop with a flourish.

      ‘Okay then. Bring on the weekend.’ She flashed him a cheeky smile, which gave him pause.

      ‘You’re not thinking of bringing the party to this house, I hope.’

      Quickly switching to a solemn expression, she gave a shake of her head. ‘Of course not. That’s not what I meant.’

      ‘Hmm.’

      The corner of her mouth twitched upwards. ‘You seem to have a really skewed impression of me. I don’t go in for heavy drinking and partying—it’s really not my style.’

      ‘Okay.’ He held up both hands. ‘Not that it’s any of my business; you can stay out all night at the weekends, for all I care,’ he said, aware of a strange plummeting sensation in his chest as images of what she might get up to out on the town flashed through his head.

      Good God, man—you’re not her keeper.

      ‘As long as your work doesn’t suffer,’ he added quickly.

      ‘Actually,’ she said, slouching back in her seat and hooking her slender arm over the back of her chair, ‘I was thinking about cooking you a meal tonight, to say thank you for letting me stay.’

      He wasn’t sure why, but the thought of that made him uncomfortable. Perhaps because it would blur the lines between employee and friend too much.

      ‘That’s kind, but I have plans tonight,’ he lied, racking his brain to remember what his friend Dan had said about his availability this weekend. Even if he was busy he was sure he could rustle up a dinner invitation somewhere else, to let Cara off the hook without any bad feelings.

      ‘And you don’t need to thank me for letting you stay here. It’s what any decent human being would have done.’

      Her face seemed to fall a little and she drew her arm back in towards her body, sliding her hands between her knees so that her shoulders hunched inwards. ‘Oh, okay, well, I’m just going to pop out and shop for my own dinner, so I’ll see you shortly,’ she said, ramping her smile back up again and wheeling her chair away from the desk with her feet.

      ‘Actually, I’m heading out myself in a minute and I’ll probably be back late, so I’ll see you tomorrow.’

      Her smile froze. ‘Right. Well, have a good night.’

      This was ridiculous. The last thing he’d wanted was for them both to feel awkward about living under the same roof.

      He let out a long sigh and pushed his hair away from his face. ‘Look, Cara, don’t think you have to hang out with me while you’re staying here. We don’t need to be in each other’s pockets the whole time. Feel free to do your own thing.’

      Clearly he’d been a bit brusque because she recoiled a little. ‘I understand,’ she said, getting up and awkwardly pushing her chair back under her desk. ‘Have a good night!’ she said in that overly chirpy way she had, which he was beginning to learn meant he’d offended her.

      Not waiting for his reply, she turned her back on him and walked straight out of the room, her shoulders stiff.

      Great. This was exactly what he’d hoped to avoid.

      He scrubbed a hand over his face. Maybe it had been a mistake to ask her to stay.

      But he couldn’t kick her out now.

      All he could do was cross his fingers and hope she’d find herself another place to live soon.

      * * *

      To his surprise, he didn’t see much of Cara over the next couple of days. She’d obviously taken his suggestion about giving each other space to heart and was avoiding being in the house with him as much as possible.

      The extremity of her desertion grated on his nerves.

      What was it that made it impossible for them to understand each other? They were very different in temperament, of course, which didn’t help, but it was more than that. It was as if there was some kind of meaning-altering force field between them.

      On Sunday, when the silence in the house got too much for him, he went out for a long walk around Hyde Park. He stopped at the café next to the water for lunch, something he and Jemima had done most Sundays, fighting against the painful undertow of nostalgia that dragged at him as he sat there alone. It was all so intensely familiar.

      All except for the empty seat in front of him.

      He snorted into his drink, disgusted with himself for being so pathetic. He should consider himself lucky. He was the one who got to have a future, unlike his big-hearted, selfless wife. The woman who everyone had loved. One of the few people, in his opinion, who had truly deserved a long and happy life.

      Arriving home mid-afternoon, he walked in to find the undertones of Cara’s perfume hanging in the air.

      So she was back then.

      Closing his eyes, he imagined he could actually sense her presence in the atmosphere, like a low hum of white noise.

      Or was he being overly sensitive?

      Probably.

      From the moment she’d agreed to move in he’d experienced a strange undercurrent of apprehension and it seemed to be affecting his state of mind.

      After