One Night with Morelli(25)

                ‘I stand corrected.’

                She pulled herself up to her full height and, bristling with dignity, looked pointedly at the route to the door he was blocking. ‘If you don’t mind…? And don’t worry.’ She flashed him a wide insincere smile, her eyes shooting daggers. ‘I will smile, but I’d prefer not to be seen coming out of the ladies’ room with you.’

                ‘It might make the world look at you in a different light.’

                She narrowed her eyes and said with fierce distaste, ‘You mean people will see me as a tart.’

                ‘No, I mean they might think you actually have a life.’

                She sucked in a breath of outrage. ‘I have a perfectly good life already and I don’t give a damn what people think.’

                ‘If that were true you wouldn’t give a damn what people think if we walk out that door together.’

                Teeth clenched in sheer frustration, she glared up at him. He couldn’t have looked smugger if…if… No, he simply couldn’t have looked smugger. ‘Just wait here.’

                ‘Shall I count to a hundred?’

                Responding to this with a disdainful sniff, she tossed her head and pushed through the doorway, pausing only to fling a ‘Thank you!’ over her shoulder.

                He didn’t count to a hundred. Instead he thought about what had just happened. Running the scene through his head, little snippets of the conversation making him frown, others smile. It had clearly hurt her to say thank you, and Draco felt a faint twinge of guilt as he knew he didn’t deserve it. The only cry of help he’d responded to was his daughter’s. He’d only come in here for Josie, because he wanted her to think he was a good guy, but in truth he wasn’t. If he had seen an hysterical woman crying in the bathroom, his instinct would not have been to wade in and help, it would have been to walk in the opposite direction very fast.

                He had his life streamlined so that he could focus on what was important—he did not get involved.

                The women standing outside reading the ‘out of order’ sign that was pinned to the door looked at him wide-eyed when he emerged.

                Ignoring their astonished stares, he unpinned the sign written in the pink lipstick his daughter was wearing and nodded.

                ‘Everything is back to normal.’

                Which was a good thing. Eve Curtis had even more issues than he had imagined; the man who got her would need a medal and a degree in counselling.





                                      CHAPTER FIVE

                DRACO JOINED HIS DAUGHTER, who was sitting at an empty table beside the dance floor. ‘The notice on the door was a nice touch.’

                ‘Is everything all right, Dad?’

                ‘Fine.’ He reached out a hand to ruffle her hair but Josie got to her feet

                ‘She’s available; I checked.’

                Draco looked down, not so very far now. Over the past ten months his daughter had grown ten inches and had gone from being a sweet, slightly chubby five-feet-one twelve-year-old to a slender, leggy thirteen-year-old; still sweet but to his parental eye worryingly mature, with the sort of coltish good looks that had already drawn two offers of modelling contracts.